We challenge you on three counts:

One: we challenge you to stop reading this short novel once you have started it.

Two: we challenge you to think of a more unusual short novel inutile mystery field.

Three: we challenge you to name another mystery story that deals with a �taboo� theme as honestly and inoffensively as Charlotte Armstrong does � or with less �sensationalism� than Charlotte Armstrong uses in handling so �delicate� a subject.

As we said above, this is one of the most unusual short novels EQMM has ever published...

Halley was sure clad the damn fog had rolled up and was billowing off over the mountains. Hey, if you looked southwest, you could even see a couple of stars. Lucky. They might have to hang around, maybe till morning.

And it was a little too quiet out here. Not much traffic on California Route 1; on a night like this there had better not be. The sea kept booming; it always did. The men shouted once in a while at their work, but they knew their business. They�d have her up on the road, and pretty quick.

Hey, here�s my chance, thought Halley, to get all the stuff down, like they keep telling me. So the young Sheriff�s Deputy opened the back door of his official car and leaned over to let the dome light fall on his paper work. The husband was sitting inside, and quiet.

�May I please have your name again, sir?� Halley used the polite official drone.

�Hugh Macroy.� The other�s voice, even in exhaustion, had a timbre and a promise of richness. A singer, maybe? Young Halley�s ear had caught this possibility when he had first answered the call. He never had seen the man � at least, not too well. Now the lighting was weird � red lights flashing on the equipment, for instance.

�Address?� Halley asked, after he had checked the spelling.

�382 Scott � no, I�m sorry. 1501 South Columbo.�

�That�s in Santa Carla, sir? Right out of L.A.?�

�Yes.� The man was holding his head at the temples, between thumb and two middle fingers. Poor old guy, he didn�t hardly remember where he lived. But Halley, who knew better than to indulge in emotions of his own over one of these routine tragedies, figured himself lucky the fellow wasn�t cracking up. �Your age, sir?�

�Forty-five.�

(Check. Kind of an old-looking guy.) �Occupation?�

�I am the Pastor at St. Andrew�s.�

Halley became a little more respectful, if possible, because... well, hell, you were supposed to be. �Just you and your wife in the car, right, sir? En route from Carmel, didn�t you say, sir? To Santa Carla?�

�We had expected to stay the night in San Luis Obispo.�

�I see, sir. Your wife�s name, please?�

�Sarah. Sarah Bright.�

Halley wrote down Sara. �Her age, please?�

�Fifty-five.�

(Huh!) �Housewife, sir, would you say?�

�I suppose so.� The man was very calm � too beat, probably, thought Halley, to be anything else. Although Halley had heard some who carried on and cried and sometimes words kept coming out of them like a damn broken faucet.

�And how long you been married?� the Deputy Sheriff continued politely.

�I think it has been two days, if today is Wednesday.� Now, in the syllables, the voice keened softly.

�Any chil�� (Oh, oh!) �Excuse me, sir.�

�There is Sarah�s daughter, in San Luis Obispo. Mrs. Geoffrey Minter. She should be told about this, as soon as may be. She will have been worrying.�

�Yes, sir,� said Halley, reacting a little crisply not only to the tone but to the grammar. �If you�ve got her address or phone, I can get her notified, right now.�

The man dictated an address and a phone number as if he were reading them from a list he could see. Halley could tell that his attention had gone away from what he was saying. He was awfully quiet.

Halley thanked him and called in from the front seat. �Okay. They�ll call her, sir. We probably won�t be here too long now,� he told the silent figure and drew himself away and shut the car doors gently.

He strolled on strong legs to the brink. He could hear the heavy water slamming into rock forty feet below. (Always did.) The night sky was clearing all the way overhead now. There was even a pale moon.

Some honeymoon, thought Halley. But he wasn�t going to say anything. It had occurred to him that this one might not be routine, not exactly, and that Halley had better watch his step, and be, at all times, absolutely correct.

�How�s it going?� he inquired cheerfully of the toilers.

Poirot described the case as �a pleasing little problem, obscure and charming� � which was surely an odd way to characterize the kidnaping of the three-year-old son and heir of one of England�s oldest families. But do not walk blithely down the garden path: Hercule Poirot�s little gray cells are clicking!

�You can understand the feelings of a mother,� said Mrs. Waverly for perhaps the sixth time.

She looked appealingly at Hercule Poirot. My little friend, always sympathetic to motherhood in distress, gesticulated reassuringly.

�But yes, but yes, I comprehend perfectly. Have faith in Papa Poirot.�

�The police�� began Mr. Waverly.

His wife interrupted.

�I won�t have anything more to do with the police. We trusted to them and look what happened! But I�d heard so much of M. Poirot and the wonderful things he�s done that I felt he might be able to help us. A mother�s feelings��

Poirot hastily stemmed the reiteration with an eloquent gesture. Mrs. Waverly�s emotion was obviously genuine, but it went strangely with her shrewd, rather hard countenance. When I heard later that she was the daughter of a prominent steel manufacturer of Birmingham who had worked his way up in the world from an office boy to his present eminence, I realized that she had inherited many paternal qualities.

Mr. Waverly was a big, florid, jovial-looking man. He stood with his legs straddled wide apart and looked the country squire type.

�I suppose you know all about this business, M. Poirot?�

The question was almost superfluous. For some days past the paper had been full of the sensational kidnaping of little Johnnie Waverly, the three-year-old son and heir of Marcus Waverly, Esq., of Waverly Court, Surrey, one of the oldest families in England.

�The main facts I know, of course, but recount to me the whole story, Monsieur, I beg of you. And in detail if you please.�

�Well, I suppose the beginning of the whole thing was about ten days ago when I got an anonymous letter � beastly things, anyway � that I couldn�t make head or tail of. The writer had the impudence to demand that I should pay him twenty-five thousand pounds � twenty-five thousand pounds, M. Poirot! Failing my agreement, he threatened to kidnap Johnnie.

�Of course I threw the thing into the wastepaper basket without more ado. Thought it was some silly joke. Five days later I got another letter. �Unless you pay, your son will be kidnaped on the twenty-ninth.� That was on the twenty-seventh.

�Ada was worried, of course, but I couldn�t bring myself to treat the matter seriously. Damn it all, we�re in England. Nobody goes about kidnaping children and holding them for ransom.�

�It is not a common practice, certainly,� said Poirot. �Proceed, Monsieur.�

�Well, Ada gave me no peace, so � feeling a bit of a fool � I laid the matter before Scotland Yard. They didn�t seem to take the thing very seriously � inclined to my view that it was some silly joke. On the twenty-eighth I got a third letter. �You have not paid. Your son will be taken from you at twelve o�clock noon tomorrow, the twenty-ninth. It will now cost you fifty thousand pounds to recover him.�

�Up I drove to Scotland Yard again. This time they were more impressed. They inclined to the view that the letters were written by a lunatic, and that in all probability an attempt of some kind would be made at the hour stated. They assured me that they would take all due precautions. Inspector McNeil and a sufficient force would come down to Waverly and take charge.

�I went home much relieved in my mind. Yet we already had the feeling of being in a state of siege. I gave orders that no stranger was to be admitted, and that no one was to leave the house.

�The evening passed off without any untoward incident, but on the following morning my wife was seriously unwell. Alarmed by her condition, I sent for Doctor Dakers. Her symptoms appeared to puzzle him. While hesitating to suggest that she had been poisoned, I could see that that was what was in his mind. There was no danger, he assured me, but it would be a day or two before she would be able to get about again.

�Returning to my own room, I was startled and amazed to find a note pinned to my pillow. It was in the same handwriting as the others and contained just three words: �At twelve o�clock.�

�I admit, M. Poirot, that then I became frightened. Someone in the house was in this � one of the servants. I had them all up, blackguarded them right and left. They never split on each other; it was Miss Collins, my wife�s companion, who informed me that she had seen Johnnie�s nurse slip down the drive early that morning.

�I taxed her with it, and she broke down. She had left the child with the nursery maid and stolen out to meet a friend of hers � a man! Pretty* goings on! She denied having pinned the note to my pillow � she may have been speaking the truth, I don�t know. I felt I couldn�t take the risk of the child�s own nurse being in the plot. One of the servants was implicated � of that I was sure.

�Finally I lost my temper and sacked the whole bunch, nurse and all. I gave them an hour to pack and get out of the house.�

Mr. Waverly�s red face was quite two shades redder as he remembered his just wrath.

�Was not that a little injudicious, Monsieur?� suggested Poirot. �For all you know, you might have been playing into the enemy�s hands.�

Mr. Waverly stared at him.

�I don�t see that. Send the whole lot packing, that was my idea. I wired to London for a fresh lot to be sent down that evening. In the meantime, there�d be only people I could trust in the house � my wife�s secretary-companion, Miss Collins, and Tredwell, the butler, who has been with me since I was a boy.�

�And this Miss Collins, how long has she been with you?�

�Just a year,� said Mrs. Waverly. �She has been invaluable to me, and is also a very efficient housekeeper.�

�The nurse?�

�She had been with me six months. She came to me with excellent references. All the same I never really liked her, although Johnnie was quite devoted to her.�

�Still, I gather she had already left when the catastrophe occurred. Perhaps, Monsieur Waverly, you will be so kind as to continue.�

Mr. Waverly resumed his narrative.

�Inspector McNeil arrived about 10:00. The servants were all gone by then. He declared himself quite satisfied with the internal arrangements. He had various men posted in the Park outside, guarding all the approaches to the house, and he assured me that if the whole thing were not a hoax, we should undoubtedly catch my mysterious correspondent.

�I had Johnnie with me, and he and I and the Inspector went together into a room we call the Council Chamber. The Inspector locked the door. There is a big grandfather clock there, and as the hands drew near to twelve I don�t mind confessing that I got as nervous as a cat.

�There was a whirring sound, and the clock began to strike. I clutched Johnnie. I had a feeling a man might drop from the skies. The last stroke sounded, and as it did so, there was a great commotion outside � shouting and running. The Inspector flung up the window and a constable came running up.

��We�ve got him, sir,� he panted. �He was sneaking up through the bushes. He�s got a whole doping outfit on him.�

�We hurried out on the terrace where two constables were holding a ruffianly-looking fellow in shabby clothes, who was twisting and turning in a vain endeavor to escape. One of the policemen held out an unrolled parcel which they had wrested from their captive. It contained a pad of cotton wool and a bottle of chloroform. It made my blood boil to see it. There was a note, too, addressed to me.

�I tore it open. It bore the following words: �You should have paid up. To ransom your son will now cost you seventy-five thousand pounds. In spite of all your precautions he has been abducted at twelve o�clock on the 29th as I said.�

�I gave a great laugh, the laugh of relief, but as I did so I heard the hum of a motor and a shout. I turned my head. Racing down the drive towards the South Lodge at a furious speed was a low, long gray car. It was the man driving who had shouted, but that was not what gave me a shock of horror. It was the sight of Johnnie�s flaxen curls. The child was in the car beside him.

�The Inspector ripped out an oath.

��The child was here not a minute ago,� he cried. His eyes swept over us. We were all there � myself, Tredwell, Miss Collins. �When did you see him last, Mr. Waverly?�

�I cast my mind back, trying to remember. When the constable had called us, I had run out with the Inspector, forgetting about Johnnie.

�And then there came a sound that startled us � the chiming of a church clock from the village. With an exclamation the Inspector pulled out his watch. It was exactly twelve o�clock. We all ran to the Council Chamber. The clock there marked the hour as ten minutes past. Someone must have deliberately tampered with it, for I have never known it gain or lose before. It is a perfect timekeeper.�

Mr. Waverly paused. Poirot smiled to himself and straightened a little mat which the anxious father had pushed askew.

�A pleasing little problem, obscure and charming,� murmured Poirot. �I will investigate it for you with pleasure. Truly it was planned � merveille.�

Mrs. Waverly looked at him reproachfully.

�But my boy,� she wailed.

Poirot hastily composed his face and looked the picture of earnest sympathy again.

�He is safe, Madame, he is unharmed. Rest assured, these miscreants will take the greatest care of him. Is he not to them the turkey � no, the goose � that lays the golden eggs?�

�M. Poirot, I�m sure there�s only one thing to be done � pay up. I was all against it at first � but now! A mother�s feelings�� Mrs. Waverly began to sob.

�But we have interrupted Monsieur in his history,� cried Poirot hastily.

�I expect you know the rest pretty well from the papers,� said Mr. Waverly. �Of course, Inspector McNeil got on to the telephone immediately. A description of the car and the man was circulated all round, and it looked at first as though everything was going to turn out all right. A car, answering to the description, with a man and a small boy, had passed through various villages, apparently making for London. At one place they had stopped, and it was noticed that the child was crying and obviously afraid of his companion.

�When Inspector McNeil announced that the car had been stopped and the man and boy detained, I was almost ill with relief. You know the sequel. The boy was not Johnnie, and the man was an ardent motorist, fond of children, who had picked up a small child playing in the streets of Edenswell, a village about fifteen miles from us, and was kindly giving him a ride. Thanks to the cocksure blundering of the police, all traces have disappeared. Had they not persistently followed the wrong car, they might by now have found the boy.�

�Calm yourself, Monsieur. The police are a brave and intelligent force of men. Their mistake was a very natural one. And altogether it was a clever scheme. As to the man they caught in the grounds, I understand that his defense has consisted all along of a persistent denial. He declares that the note and parcel were given to him to deliver at Waverly Court. The man who gave them to him handed him a ten shilling note and promised him another if it were delivered at exactly ten minutes to twelve. He was to approach the house through the grounds and knock at the side door.�

�I don�t believe a word of it,� declared Mrs. Waverly. �It�s all a parcel of lies.�

�En verit�, it is a thin story,� said Poirot reflectively. �But so far they have not shaken it. I understand also that he made a certain accusation?�

His glance interrogated Mr. Waverly. The latter got rather red again.

�The fellow had the impertinence to pretend that he recognized in Tredwell the man who gave him the parcel. �Only the bloke has shaved off his mustache.� Tredwell, who was born on the estate!�

Poirot smiled a little at the country gentleman�s indignation.

�Yet you yourself suspect an inmate of the house to have been accessory to the abduction.�

�Yes, but not Tredwell.�

�And you, Madame?� asked Poirot, turning to her.

�It could not have been Tredwell who gave this tramp the letter and parcel � if anybody ever did, which I don�t believe� It was given him at ten o�clock, he says. At ten o�clock Tredwell was with my husband in the smoking room.�

�Were you able to see the face of the man in the car, Monsieur? Did it resemble that of Tredwell in any way?�

�It was too far away for me to see his face.�

�Has Tredwell a brother, do you know?�

�He had several, but they are all dead. The last one was killed in the war.�

�I am not yet clear as to the grounds of Waverly Court. The car was heading for the South Lodge. Is there another entrance?�

�Yes, what we call the East Lodge. It can be seen from the other side of the house.�

�It seems to me strange that nobody saw the car entering the grounds.�

�There is a right of way, and access to a small chapel. A good many cars pass through. The man must have stopped the car in a convenient place, and run up to the house just as the alarm was given and attention attracted elsewhere.�

�Unless he was already inside the house,� mused Poirot. �Is there any place where he could have hidden?�

�Well, we certainly didn�t make a thorough search of the house beforehand. There seemed no need. I suppose he might have hidden himself somewhere, but who would have let him in?�

�We shall come to that later. One thing at a time � let us be methodical. There is no special hiding place in the house? Waverly Court is an old place, and there are sometimes �Priests� Holes� as they call them.�

�By Gad, there is a Priest�s Hole. It opens from one of the panels in the hall.�

�Near the Council Chamber?�

�Just outside the door.�

�Voil�!�

�But nobody knows of its existence except my wife and myself.�

�Tredwell?�

�Well � he might have heard of it.�

�Miss Collins?�

�I never mentioned it to her.�

Poirot reflected for a minute.

�Well, Monsieur, the next thing is for me to come down to Waverly Court. If I arrive this afternoon, will it suit you?�

�Oh, as soon as possible, please, Monsieur Poirot,� cried Mrs. Waverly. �Read this once more.�

She thrust into his hands the last missive from the kidnaper which had reached the Waverlys that morning and which had sent her posthaste to Poirot. It gave clever and explicit directions for the paying over of the ransom money, and ended with a threat that the boy�s life would pay for any treachery.

Poirot detained Mrs. Waverly for a minute behind her husband.

�Madame, the truth, if you please. Do you share your husband�s faith in the butler, Tredwell?�

�I have nothing against him, Monsieur Poirot, and I cannot see how he can have been concerned in this, but... well, I have never liked him � never!�

�One other thing, Madame: can you give me the address of the child�s nurse?�

�149 Netherall Road, Hammersmith. You don�t imagine��

�Never do I imagine. Only � I employ the little gray cells. And sometimes, just sometimes, I have a little idea.�

Poirot came back to me as the door closed.

�So Madame has never liked the butler. It is interesting, that, eh, Hastings?�

I refused to be drawn. Poirot has deceived me so often that I now go warily. There is always a catch somewhere.

After Poirot had completed an elaborate brushing and combing, we set off for Netherall Road. We were fortunate enough to find Miss Jessie Withers at home. She was a pleasant-faced woman of 35, capable and superior. I could not believe that she could be mixed up in the affair. She was bitterly resentful of the way she had been dismissed, but admitted that she had been in the wrong.

She was engaged to be married to a painter and decorator who happened to be in the neighborhood, and she had run out to meet him. The thing seemed natural enough. I could not quite understand Poirot. All his questions seemed to me quite irrelevant. They were concerned mainly with the daily routine of her life at Waverly Court. I was frankly bored, and glad when Poirot took his departure.

�Kidnaping is an easy job, mon ami,� he observed, as we hailed a taxi in the Hammersmith Road and ordered it to drive to Waterloo. �That child could have been abducted with the greatest ease any day for the last three years.�

�I don�t see that that advances us much,� I remarked.

�Au contraire, it advances us enormously, but enormously! If you must wear a tie pin, Hastings, at least let it be in the exact center of your tie. At present it is at least one-sixteenth of an inch to the right.�

Waverly Court was a fine old place and had recently been restored with taste and care. Mr. Waverly showed us the Council Chamber, the terrace, and all the various spots connected with the case. Finally, at Poirot�s request, he pressed a spring in the wall, a panel slid aside, and a short passage led us into the �Priest�s Hole.�

�You see,� said Waverly. �There is nothing here.�

The tiny room was bare enough � there was not even the mark of a footstep on the floor. I joined Poirot where he was bending attentively over a mark in the corner.

�What do you make of this, my friend?�

There were four imprints close together.

�A dog,� I cried.

�A very small dog, Hastings.�

�A pom.�

�Smaller even than a pom. A species unknown to the Kennel Club.�

I looked at him. His face was alight with excitement and satisfaction.

�I was right,� he murmured. �I knew I was right. Come, Hastings.�

As we stepped out into the hall and the panel closed behind us, a young lady came out of a door farther down the passage. Mr. Waverly presented her to us.

�Miss Collins.�

Miss Collins was about 30 years of age, brisk and alert in manner. She had fair, rather dull hair, and wore pince-nez.

At Poirot�s request we went into a small morning room and he questioned her closely as to the servants and particularly as to Tredwell. She admitted that she did not like the butler.

�He gives himself airs,� she explained.

They then went into the question of the food eaten by Mrs. Waverly on the night of the 28th. Miss Collins declared that she had partaken of the same dishes upstairs in her sitting room and had felt no ill effects. As she was departing I nudged Poirot.

�The dog,� I whispered.

�Ah, yes, the dog!� He smiled broadly. �Is there a dog kept here by any chance, Mademoiselle?�

�There are two retrievers in the kennels outside.�

�No, I mean a small dog, a toy dog.�

�No � nothing of the kind.�

Poirot permitted her to depart. Then, pressing the bell, he remarked to me, �She lies, that Mademoiselle Collins. Possibly I should also in her place. Now the butler.�

Tredwell was a dignified individual. He told his story with perfect aplomb, and it was essentially the same as that of Mr. Waverly. He admitted that he knew the secret of the Priest�s Hole.

When he finally withdrew, pontifical to the last, I met Poirot�s quizzical eyes.

�What do you make of it all, Hastings?�

�What do you?� I parried.

�How cautious you become. Never, never will the gray cells function unless you stimulate them. Ah, but I will not tease you! Let us make our deductions together. What points strike us as being especially difficult?�

�There is one thing that strikes me,� I said. �Why did the man who kidnaped the child go out by the South Lodge instead of by the East Lodge where no one would see him?�

�That is a very good point, Hastings, an excellent one. I will match it with another. Why warn the Waverlys beforehand? Why not simply kidnap the child and hold him for ransom?�

�Because they hoped to get the money without being forced to action.�

�Surely it was very unlikely that the money would be paid on a mere threat?�

�Also they wanted to focus attention on twelve o�clock, so that when the tramp man was seized the kidnaper could emerge from his hiding place and get away with the child unnoticed.�

�That does not alter the fact that they were making a thing difficult that was perfectly easy. If they do not specify a time or date, nothing would be easier than to wait their chance and carry off the child in a motor one day when he is out with his nurse.�

�Ye-es,� I admitted.

�In fact, there is a deliberate playing of the farce! Now let us approach the question from another side. Everything goes to show that there was an accomplice inside the house. Point Number One: the mysterious poisoning of Mrs. Waverly. Point Number Two: the letter pinned to the pillow. Point Number Three: the advancing of the clock ten minutes � all inside jobs. And an additional fact that you may not have noticed. There was no dust in the Priest�s Hole. It had been swept clean with a broom.

�Now then, we have four people in the house. We can exclude the nurse, since she could not have swept out the Priest�s Hole, though she could have attended to the other three points. Four people. Mr. and Mrs. Waverly � Tredwell the butler � and Miss Collins.

�We will take Miss Collins first. We have nothing much against her except that we know very little about her, that she is obviously an intelligent young woman, and that she has only been here a year.�

�She lied about the dog, you said,� I reminded him.

�Ah, yes, the dog,� Poirot gave a peculiar smile. �Now let us pass to Tredwell. There are several suspicious facts against him. For one thing, the tramp declares that it was Tredwell who gave him the parcel in the village.�

�But Tredwell can prove an alibi on that point.�

�Even then, he could have poisoned Mrs. Waverly, pinned the note to the pillow, put the clock ahead, and swept out the Priest�s Hole. On the other hand, he has been born and bred in the service of the Waverlys. It seems unlikely that he should connive at the abduction of the son of the house. It is just not in the picture!�

�Well, then?�

�We must proceed logically � however absurd it may seem. We will briefly consider Mrs. Waverly. But she is rich, the money is hers. It is her money which has restored this impoverished estate. There would be no reason for her to kidnap her son and pay over her own money to herself.

�Her husband, now, is in a different position. He has a rich wife. It is not the same thing as being rich himself � in fact, I have a little idea that the lady is not very fond of parting with her money, except on a very good pretext. But Mr. Waverly, you can see at once, he is bon viveur.�

�Impossible,� I spluttered. �Kidnap his own son?�

�Impossible?�� not at all. Who sends away the servants? Mr. Waverly. He can write the notes, drug his wife, advance the hands of the clock, and establish an excellent alibi for his faithful retainer, Tredwell. Tredwell has never liked Mrs. Waverly. He is devoted to his master, and is willing to obey his orders implicitly.

�There were three of them in it. Waverly, Tredwell, and some friend of Waverly. That is the mistake the police made � they made no further inquiries about the man who drove the gray car with the wrong child in it. He was the third man. He picks up a child in a village nearby, a boy with flaxen curls. He drives in through the East Lodge and passes out through the South Lodge just at the right moment, waving his hand and shouting. They cannot see his face or the number of the car, so obviously they cannot see the child�s face either. Then he lays a false trail to London.

�In the meantime, Tredwell has done his part in arranging for the parcel and note to be delivered by a rough-looking gentleman. His master can provide an alibi in the unlikely case of the man recognizing him, in spite of the false mustache he wore. As for Mr. Waverly, as soon as the hullabaloo occurs outside, and the Inspector rushes out, he quickly hides the child in the Priest�s Hole, and then follows the Inspector out. Later in the day, when the Inspector is gone and Miss Collins is out of the way, it will be easy enough to drive the child to some safe place in his own car.�

�But what about the dog?� I asked. �And Miss Collins lying?�

�That was my little joke. I asked her if there were any toy dogs in the house, and she said no � but doubtless there are some � in the nursery! You see, Mr. Waverly placed some toys in the Priest�s Hole to keep Johnnie amused and quiet.�

�M. Poirot.� Mr. Waverly entered the room. �Have you discovered anything? Have you any clue to where the boy has been taken?�

Poirot handed him a piece of paper.

�Here is the address.�

�But this is a blank sheet.�

�Because I am waiting for you to write it down for me.�

�What the�� Mr. Waverly�s face turned purple.

�I know everything, Monsieur. I give you twenty-four hours to return the boy. Your ingenuity will be equal to the task of explaining his reappearance. Otherwise, Mrs. Waverly will be informed of the exact sequence of events.�

Mr. Waverly sank down in a chair and buried his face in his hands.

�He is with my old nurse, ten miles away. He is happy and well cared for.�

�I have no doubt of that. If I did not believe you to be a good father at heart, I should not be willing to give you another chance.�

�The scandal��

�Exactly. Your name is an old and honored one. Do not jeopardize it again. Good evening, Mr. Waverly. Ah, by the way, one word of advice. Always sweep in the corners!�

�How could he have been murdered? He was all alone on this path. There wasn�t anybody within a hundred yards of him... No one could have touched him. And yet he was stabbed...� Exactly the kind of case for Colonel March, head of D3 Department at Scotland Yard, better known as the Department of Queer Complaints...

Under the white light of daybreak the beach seemed deserted for a full half-mile toward the headland. The tide was out, showing a muddy slope at the foot of smooth sand. But it had begun to turn, and flat edges of surf moved snakily back toward the beach.

A narrow lane led down to it, between the high and crooked banks which closed it off from the road. Until you were well out on the sands it was impossible even to see Norman Kane�s cottage some distance up toward the right. But one landmark showed in a dark wedge against sand and sea. For several hundred yards out into the water a line of rocks ran in humped formation, curved at the end, in a way that suggested the paw of an animal. It seemed to catch at the incoming tide. Bill Stacey knew it at once for the Lion�s Paw, and he set off down the lane toward the beach.

It is to Stacey�s credit that he still felt moderately cheerful after having just tramped two miles on an empty stomach, carrying a heavy suitcase. Norman Kane had specified the train he was to take from London, and the wayside station at which it would land him. But Kane had said nothing about a certain lack of transport at that hour of the morning.

The prospect of seeing Marion � Kane�s niece and secretary � so cheered him that he forgot the matter. He did not know whether Kane knew he was in love with Marion. Norman Kane had for him the slightly amused tolerance with which Kane would naturally regard an easy-going journalist like Stacey. And Stacey, in turn, had concealed from a hero-worshipping Marion his belief that Norman Kane was an imposing, dignified, and strenuous crook.

For in his way Kane was a great man, a power in the City and a company-juggler of skill. And he was genuinely fond of Marion, as he was of all his dependents. With his theatricalism went tireless energy; it was only at Dr. Hastings� orders, when he had developed signs of a bad heart, that he had been dragged off for the summer to South Wales.

Heart trouble, Stacey knew, was often the case with these ex-athletes who have run to fat. Kane�s worried looks, Marion�s worried looks, had disturbed him the last time he saw them. But as he came out on the beach in the morning light, he felt that nothing ever could happen to Kane.

There was the man himself. Even at a distance he recognized Kane�s bulky figure, jauntily wrapped in a dark-red bathrobe with white facings, striding along with a towel over his arm, kicking the sand out of his way with rubber slippers. His bathrobe made a spot of color against that lonely shore, where the Lion�s Paw stretched out into the tide.

And Kane strode out briskly along the Paw. He was not going to bathe. He was going out along the rocks to dive.

�Here!� Stacey said aloud. Swimming, in that sea, with a bad heart? The mutter of the surf was growing as it drove in, and the farther end of the Paw was already awash.

�Ahoy there!� he yelled. �Kane! Hoy!�

The cry seemed to linger in emptiness across the sands. But it reached Kane, who turned round. He was some fifty yards out on the ridge, but he lifted his towel and waved it.

�Ahoy, my lad!� he bellowed back. �I didn�t expect you so early. Come for a dip! The water�s fine. Everything is��

Then it happened.

Stacey never forgot that big, grayish-haired figure, framed against the sea and the dark crook of the Lion�s Paw. He was too far away to catch the expression on Kane�s face. But Kane�s voice died away in a gulp, a puzzled kind of gulp, and his shoulders drew together. For a moment he stood looking at the beach, swaying a little and pressing his arms as though he were cold. Then he pitched forward on his face like a bag of sand.

It was a second or two before Stacey began to run. As he did so he noticed other figures moving on the beach. From some distance away to the right, in the direction of Kane�s cottage, he saw Marion running toward him. There was a gleam on her yellow hair; she wore a bathing suit and a beachrobe blown out by the wind. Behind her lumbered Dr. Hastings, in a white linen suit.

But Stacey did not wait for him. He knew instinctively that something had happened to Norman Kane, something worse than a faint.

Along the top of the Lion�s Paw there had been worn a natural sunken path some two feet wide. Picking his way out across this, he found Kane�s great bulk wedged into it. Kane�s right hand, still clutching the towel, was doubled under him; his left hand lay limply outstretched ahead. Stacey took his pulse, but there was no pulse.

He stood staring down, listening to the slap and swing of the water against the rocks. Heart gone: just like that. At that moment he did not notice the small hole or tear in the back of the dark-red bathrobe, just over the heart. He was too dazed to notice anything more than the fact of death. He hurried back to the beach, where he met Marion and Dr. Hastings.

�Steady,� he said, as the girl tried to push past him. �You�d better go out there, Doctor. But I�m afraid he�s done for.�

None of them moved. He could not quite estimate the effect of his words on Kane�s niece. He realized, too, that he had never before seen Marion without her glasses, which had added a businesslike and almost prim touch to her good looks. Over her shoulder towered Dr. Hastings, whose wiry, close-cut hair had a Teutonic look, and his expression a Teutonic heaviness.

�Oh!� said the girl. She was looking at him curiously, and she breathed hard. �Was it � suicide?�

�Suicide?� repeated Stacey, startled. �No. His heart gave out. Why should you think it was suicide?�

�Oh!� said Marion again. She put her hand on his arm and pressed it. �I want to see him. No, I�m quite all right. I hope I can move. I can�t think very well.�

Dr. Hastings, who seemed about to launch a violent protest, checked himself and pushed past. They went with him to the body, and watched while he made his examination. Then he urged them back toward the beach.

�Look here,� Hastings began heavily. He cleared his throat, and tried again. �Yes, he�s dead right enough; but possibly not for the reason you think. Do you know if Lionel is up yet, Marion?�

So that fellow was at the cottage, thought Stacey. He had never liked the supercilious and esthetic Mr. Lionel Pell. Norman Kane had once courted Lionel�s mother, in the days before she had married the late Mr. Pell; and this seemed to give Lionel the idea that he had some claim on Kane, particularly with regard to sponging.

�Lionel?� repeated Marion. �I... I haven�t seen him. I got up and went out for an early swim on the other side of the bay. But I shouldn�t think he was up yet. Why?�

�Because,� replied Dr. Hastings with his usual directness, �he�ll have to get out his car and drive to the village and get the police. I�m afraid this is murder.�

The surf was driving in now, with deepening thunder. A wave veered against the rocks and flung up a ghostly mane of spray. A cold wind had begun to blow from the south, fluttering Marion�s beachrobe. She looked at the doctor with rather blind blue eyes, blinking as though to keep back tears.

�We had better go up to the house,� Hastings went on, �and get something to use as a stretcher: he�s a weight to move. There are some bad crosscurrents out at this distance when the tide rises, and we don�t want him washed out to sea before the police get here.�

Then Stacey found his voice.

�The police? Good God, what do you want with the police? His heart��

�His heart was as sound as yours or mine,� said Hastings.

�So,� said Marion, �you knew that.�

�I should hope I knew it, my dear girl. I happen to be his doctor. Now keep your chin up and let�s face the facts. He�s been murdered. What little blood there is doesn�t show up well against that dark-red bathrobe; but you probably noticed it. And you may have seen the cut in the back of the bathrobe just over the heart.�

Stacey put his arm round Marion, who had begun to tremble. He spoke with restraint.

�Look here, Doctor. I don�t like to suggest that you�re out of your mind, but you might come aside and talk nonsense to me instead of talking it to her. Murdered? How could he have been murdered? He was all alone on this path. There wasn�t anybody within a hundred yards of him. You must have seen that for yourself.�

�That�s true,� put in Marion suddenly. �I was sitting up at the top of the beach, up under the bank, getting dry; and I saw him go past. That is true, Doctor.�

�Yes. It is true. I saw him from the veranda of the cottage,� agreed Hastings.

�Then why all this talk about murder?� asked Stacey. �Hold on! Are you saying he was shot with a long-range rifle, or something of the sort? It would have to be very long range. His back was towards the sea when he was hit, and there were several miles of empty water behind him.�

�No, I am not saying that.�

�Well?�

�He was killed,� answered Dr. Hastings slowly, �with some kind of steel point like an old-fashioned hatpin. That�s what I think, anyhow. I haven�t removed it. And I can�t swear to the exact nature of the weapon until the post-mortem.�

In last month�s installment Stephen Duane registered in a hotel under his true name and waited in his room for a girl to join him in the pretense of being caught in flagrante delicto � caught �in the act� by his wife, her lawyer, the hotel detective, and a photographer. Stephen Duane didn�t like it, but he had no choice.

The first part of the story ended with the discovery that the girl had died in the bed during the break-in and photographing. �And the next thing Steve knew, the door slammed shut and he was alone and half dressed in a hotel room, with a dead stranger on the bed to explain away.�

The unknown girl had been murdered, and Steve Duane was in the greatest peril of his life... Now finish this fascinating story by the one and only Cornell Woolrich...

The room they had put Duane in looked like an office. It was that in every sense of the word, because any room used to transact business is an office. And investigating a sudden death is a business. Even though it�s non-commercial, non-profit-making, it�s still a business. The business of the police.

This business office was in the precinct house that had jurisdiction over the area in which the death had occurred; the office was not chic � it was shabby, smudgy, and shopworn. But then neither is death chic; it too is shabby, smudgy, and shopworn. So the market place matched the commodity.

There were filing cabinets around three walls � sheet-iron baked an ugly olive-green, which even when it was new must have been bilious-conjuring, and now it wasn�t new any more. Each cabinet had a red-edged label slotted into the front, but all these had on them were capital index-letters, two or three to a bracket, in the usual alphabetical order. A couple of letters, X and Z, had been left out, probably because they were too seldom used.

What lay in back of the index-letters was inscrutable � a secret of police bookkeeping. The only sign that the letters were ever used at all � and that sign was not conclusive � was that someone in a hurry had once forgotten to pat down one of the inside cards even with the rest, and the closing of the cabinet drawer had caught a corner of it, bent it over, and held it sticking out in a little white triangle. It might have happened yesterday or it might have happened a year before, but no one had ever bothered to straighten it out. They all seemed to go to that particular cabinet for some other card, and they didn�t have time for that one.

A dog-eared file card, carelessly left that way, even though somebody�s life blood may have once been inscribed on it. What is life but a dog-eared file card anyway, pulled out, pushed back again, by some big anonymous thumb.

Duane was sitting at a battered table. He was in that nebulous classification known to the police as �Mind if we ask you a few questions?� This was far short of any state of actual detention. And yet at the same time it was definitely not the status designated as �Well, that�ll be all; you can go now.� He hadn�t tried getting up and leaving, but he had a pretty good idea that if he had, it would have been brought home to him, tactfully but firmly, that that was not the status he was in. The bottommost, of course, of all these echelons was the unwelcome and least sought-after (by the police themselves) beginning: �Lady, we�re pretty busy down here; maybe if you ask them yourself, in a nice way, they�ll tone down the volume of their TV set.�

But the top one of all, the peak, the dread climax, the final category beyond which there was no going, seldom used and seldom wasted, was wordless: a rough-armed shove into a chair and an incisive jerk of a thumb to a stenographer to begin shorthanding a confession.

Repeat: the dread climax, the culmination � a wordless shove onto a chair and a thumb-jerked signal to a stenographer to start shorthanding a confession.

There was another man sitting at the table with Duane. He was in unmarked clothing, of course, and what his exact rank was Duane couldn�t tell, never having been an aficionado of these processes until today. (And not today, either.) But since all the verbal messages and asides and all the written reports and memos that were floating around the place seemed to converge and land on this other man, it was a good guess that he was high up in the investigation. He was the crux of the proceedings � even Duane�s uninitiated eye could perceive that.

Both of them had cigarettes smoking, but each in a different way, each indicative of his mood and present situation. Duane�s was held tautly in his hand, rising jaggedly every few moments. The other man was smoking calmly, abstractedly, almost like an absent-minded schoolteacher going over his pupil�s homework, letting it balance across the rim of the table until most of it was wasted.

Duane had a nagging impression that his table-mate had joined him in smoking (in fact, he was the one who had encouraged it) in an artful attempt to make him feel relaxed, to put him at ease (and by the same token, off-guard), in a sort of simulated camaraderie that was not only less than skin-deep but was ready to vanish altogether from one moment to the next at the first wrong word Duane said. In any case, as a sedative, the cigarette wasn�t working at all. He didn�t like where he was, and he didn�t like why he was where he was. And though the sum-total of his physical exertion since he�d been sitting here was simply to uncross and recross his legs, his heartbeat felt like someone knocking on a door.

The homicide man spoke unusually good English. Duane had an idea he�d gone to night school to acquire it. But his face didn�t go with it. They don�t hand those out at night school. His looked like that of a bricklayer whose face had once got caught between two of his own bricks. And left mortared-in overnight. At the same time he spoke like an angel � an angel with a Princeton degree.

�Wasn�t there any other way to do it?� he was asking. �Couldn�t you have avoided such a charade, such a travesty, which in the end fools no one? Everyone�s in on it � you, your wife, both lawyers, and even the court that hears the evidence must smell a rat; what it amounts to is collusion of the worst sort. I realize that under our present New York State law, proven adultery is the only admissible grounds, but then why couldn�t you have gone out of town for it instead? To Reno or Juarez or one of those places? We�re just simple cops down here, and it�s not our detail, but I have no sympathy for anyone who twists around the law that way.�

Duane squirmed guiltily and turned even paler. �She was the one bringing the action,� he explained defensively. �And she didn�t want to leave New York. She had somebody else interested in her, and she was afraid she�d lose him if she went away. There�s an old saying: �Absence makes the heart grow fonder � for somebody else.��

�Fine bunch of cynics,� growled the police officer, shaking his head disgustedly. �I believe we should keep our bargains, good or bad, when it comes to marriage. And it�s for people like you we�re supposed to risk our necks and��

He didn�t finish, but went back to his own stamping grounds, while Duane looked down boyishly.

�And you say you never saw this girl before?�

�I never set eyes on her before in my life until she knocked at the hotel-room door.�

�And you didn�t know her name either?�

�We didn�t exchange names.�

�You got into a bed together, but you didn�t exchange names,� the policeman commented drily.

Duane looked down again. I didn�t know she was going to die, he felt like saying, but he thought he�d better not; it sounded too flippant, and he didn�t feel that way about it. Then he thought he should have said it after all � at least, it would have shown he hadn�t expected her to die, and therefore wasn�t responsible for it. But by that time it was too late to say it.

�Would you care to know her name now?�

Duane gave a fatalistic shrug.

�Her name was Rose Metz, but she co-responded under the name of Rose Metcalf.� He shook his head dolefully. �Apparently even in her line of work a fancier name is considered an advantage.�

�Don�t you think it�s more likely that she had too much respect for her family and her people to want to drag down their good name?�

There had been a verbal trap there, he supposed. Not a very deep or devious one, just a surface attempt to elicit recognition or surprise on his face. Which of course wasn�t forthcoming, because Duane had genuinely never heard the girl�s name before.

The homicide man leafed through a report which had already been there on the desk before him when Duane first came in. Apparently this was not a first reading, but a refresher to confirm what he had read the first time. Apparently also, it was a medical report.

�There�s no question of a coronary or any other natural cause. She died of a specific. Its name is nitrobenzene, and it was ingested through the skin, according to the Medical Examiner. Even a few drops on the skin are enough to bring on sudden prostration and sometimes death. Which in this case was not observable because she was already lying quiet in the bed beside you.

�One of the nervous starts following the flash lights might, in her case, have been the act of death occurring, and therefore passed without notice. The M.E. says all the classic symptoms were found to be present: the blood had turned chocolate color, the face gray, the fingernails dark purple, the organs had an odor of bitter almonds, and a few other things that require a pretty strong stomach to listen to, so we don�t need to go into them here. The chemical formula for this beauty is C₆H₅NO₂, and it destroys the oxygen-carrying red blood cells. The technical form of death is therefore respiratory paralysis, or in everyday talk, asphyxiation.� And in an admiring aside to himself he said, �He�s got everything down, this guy.�

Sounds almost too dramatic to be true, Duane thought, but he didn�t say so aloud.

The homicide man seemed to read his mind. Or maybe his own progression of thoughts had followed the same course, so they had come out at the same place. �Death can be very dramatic,� he said, �Especially quick death like this in a young body.�

He slid the report aside. �All right, we know the medical cause. Let�s go on from there. Now, there are two possibilities: either it was self-administered, or it was administered by someone else. We call the first suicide. We call the second murder.�

What is this, Duane wondered, again to himself. A class in police semantics?

�In the first, the act destroys the person who commits the act, so there is nothing left. In the second, the act destroys someone who is not the person who commits the act. That�s where we come in � to find the administerer and pass him or her on for punishment.�

Duane noticed the inclusion of the feminine pronoun. But the only other woman participating in the scene or present at it had been his wife Dolly. A blurred question mark formed in his mind, then faded away again. Still, it might have been just a form of speech. Dolly had remained standing near the door the whole time � he remembered that much; she hadn�t come any farther into the room from first to last.

�There were seven of you in the room all told at one time or another, from time of your check-in to time of police arrival. But not concurrently, not all at the same time.�

He told them off with the end of a pencil against the tips of his fingers, one by one.

�There were: Arnold Kellgard, your attorney. Joey Guzman, the room-service waiter who brought the drinks. Your wife, Dolly Duane. Kevin Cronin, her attorney. Bill Moyer, the hotel security-officer. And Stan Roark, the photographer � the kind of a guy who photographs girls on the half shell for calendars and post cards not meant to be sent through the mail.

�And you,� he concluded neatly.

�You are the only one,� he went on to point out, �who was in the room from start to finish. You run through the thing from beginning to end. From your taking the room until your call to the police.�

�You make me feel good,� Duane couldn�t help mumbling morosely.

�And another thing. You are the only one of the seven who was alone with the girl at any time, without anyone else being present. This happened twice, according to our reconstruction. For a very considerable stretch of say, fifteen minutes between the time you admitted her to the room and the time the fake raiders �broke in.� And again between the time you called us and the time we got there. But by that time she was dead, so we won�t count that one. Although you might have had a chance to dispose of things, such as whatever was left of the nitrobenzene and whatever had been used to carry it in � whatever traces there were around.�

�I didn�t even know what had been used, at that time,� Duane protested with unconvincing logic, �so how could I have disposed of whatever it had been carried in? I wouldn�t have known it even if I saw it.�

�What went on during those fifteen minutes you were alone with her the first time?�

�I told you.�

�Tell it again then.� It was said without any hostility. But he was looking for variations to creep in, Duane knew.

�She said, �Are you the gentleman?� I offered to wait in the hall for her to get ready. Instead she went into the bathroom, locked the door on the inside, got ready, and came out. I offered her a drink. She didn�t take one.�

�She didn�t; right,� the homicide man confirmed. �We checked the used glasses on that.�

�She sat down on the other side of the bed from me and started looking through a movie magazine.�

�You say a movie magazine. How do you know it was a movie magazine?�

�I spotted a picture of Sophia Loren from where I was sitting.�

The police officer opened a drawer, took out a large manila folder, took a movie magazine out of that, and started leafing through it. He stopped when he came to a full-page picture of Sophia Loren. He looked at Duane. �She was reading a movie magazine,� was all he said on that. �Go on.�

�We talked a little, and she told me how she had come to take such jobs, in the beginning. The thought of what she was doing seemed to depress her. Then they knocked on the door and she hurried into bed.� And without quite knowing how it had got in there, he heard himself blurt out, �I liked her.�

This was a variation all right, but a benign one. He could tell by the expression on the other�s face that its ingenuousness had struck him favorably.

�And you didn�t come close to her, didn�t touch her in any way, at any time?�

�Not even from the opposite ends of a cigarette I held out to her which she didn�t take; she didn�t smoke.� His pace of speech quickened a little. �Oh, I nearly forgot. That reminds me. I did leave out something both times, I don�t know if it�s important or not. She asked if she could use the phone, and she called up a Mrs. D, a neighbor of hers, to ask how her little boy was. This Mrs. D was looking after him for her.�

The homicide man got up immediately, went over to the door opening onto the corridor, and called out to someone. �Check out a Mrs. D, same house and same floor as the Metz girl. Go up and have a talk with her. Maybe she can fill us in on some background data.�

Someone said, �Right.�

When he�d come back to the table, he gave Duane the ultimate in compliments, from a police officer to a questionee. �You�ve come up with a pretty good batting average.� Then he took a little of the shine out of it by adding, �So far.�

�We give each and every one a dry run first,� he said as he sat down again. �Then some we may call in a second time, and some even a third time. And out of all of them, sooner or later somebody stays in for keeps.

�But my own feeling, and that�s why I�m being so open about this and letting you sit in on it the way I am, is that the final break, when it comes, won�t be at this end at all. Won�t be at the hotel room either. It�ll be at the other end, at the point of origin. At the place where the stuff was purchased, stolen, or otherwise obtained. Access to and possession of. That�s where the breakthrough will come. Because otherwise nobody has a motive worth a nickel.

�Since this wasn�t a genuine wife-cheating, only a set-up, your wife Dolly certainly doesn�t have any motive; the girl was helping her get the very thing she wanted � divorce evidence. Why should she demolish the evidence by doing away with its donor? No motive.

�The same goes for both lawyers. Their fees in this case depended on the girl�s services. No motive, no motive.

�The hotel security-man � this may not be for the squeamish � gets a cut or a kickback out of the proceedings, just as he does out of other kinds of night calls in that type of hotel, which we don�t have to go into here.�

Duane noticed he had omitted to mention three of the seven: the photographer, the room-service waiter, and himself. He hitched around on his chair, as though it were becoming overheated.

�Let�s have them all in for a second processing,� the homicide man said. He picked up his phone. �Send Moyer the hotel dick in.�

�Sit down, Bill.� The investigator used the man-to-man technique on him, Duane noticed.

Moyer made an informal hydraulic-crane shape out of one leg across the top of the other, then hung onto the ankle of it with both hands as though to make sure the ankle didn�t detach itself from the rest of the leg.

�You�d already seen the girl before you flagged down the room. That what you told us before?�

�I seen her going up. I knew what she was there for,�

�How�d you know?�

�I�d seen her do the same trick before, that�s how I knew.�

�You didn�t object?�

�Look, if the hotel don�t care, why should I? I work for the hotel. It�s gotta be done somewhere.�

�You a married man, Bill?�

�That�s a handout from the birds,� said Bill poetically.

�Got a girl, Bill?�

�Three or four,� said Bill.

�She one of them?�

�Narrh,� said Bill, as if his good taste was being questioned. �She din� get to me,� he explained succinctly.

�In other words, you didn�t like her but you didn�t dislike her either.�

�I was completely newtrull,� Bill said.

Exit Moyer the hotel detective.

�Not the type,� was the interrogator�s exonerating remark. �A chemical agent would be too subtle for him. His way would more likely be to break a girl�s neck between his bare hands and bring down the walls and half the ceiling while he was about it, with enough noise for the riot squad to be called.�

Next came Stan Roark the photographer.

The homicide man�s approach this time was unfriendly and unbending, Duane soon caught on � the normal reaction of the detective to anything veering toward the shady side.

�Do much of this stuff?� was his opener.

�What stuff?� was the to-be-expected answer to the gambit.

�Taking phony pictures for spiked divorce cases.�

�Cronin called me and told me he wanted me to take pictures of a couple in a hotel room. He told me what hotel, which room, and what time to be there. That�s all I know.�

The homicide man raised his voice to an ugly yell. �Well, that isn�t all we know! He�s a mind reader, ha? That�s how he knew ahead of time which room in which hotel they were going to be in, and what time they were going to be in there! If that isn�t a souped-up��

�Taking pictures isn�t illegal. I don�t plead the case, he pleads it. He�s the one you want to talk to, not me.�

This didn�t do the questioning-officer�s mood any good. �One of these I-know-my-legal-rights creeps, eh? Try to give me that, and I�ll rub your dirty nose in this mess, I promise you!�

And he proceeded to do the talking the other had tried to sidestep. �How long have you known this girl?� he asked ominously.

�Never saw her before,� came the clipped answer.

�Let�s see if he�s got her listed.� Again the man in charge of the investigation took out one of those manila envelope-folders, all ticketed and indexed for ready reference. From this one he took out a black pocket-size address-and-telephone notebook, its pages warped and swollen by numerous postscript-entries, thumbings-through, and holdings at an open split while in use, so that the pages no longer fell together flat the way they should have.

He handed it to someone else at the table, though. This was so there could be audible playback between them, for Roark to hear. A man thumbing a book can�t talk to himself out loud; he can, but it�s not very convincing.

�Wherdge get that?� Roark alerted with instant ownership-jealousy.

�At that cockroachy loft you call a studio,� was the noncourteous answer. �Look under N first,� he instructed the man with the book. This was a deliberate false lead, Duane guessed, so that relief would show on Roark�s face at their obvious lack of accurate information, and later give him away if he really did know her name. There was no other way to explain it. Duane could see the homicide man watching Roark�s face with target-practice intentness.

Nothing showed on it. Not even the effort to make sure that nothing did show.

�Try M, then.�

Still nothing showed. He really doesn�t know her name, Duane became convinced.

�Try R for Rose, without any second name.�

Nothing showed � not in the book, not on the face.

�Go on, get out of here!� roared the examiner in dismissal, with all the irritability of any person, policeman or layman, who comes out second-best. �But don�t think we�re not going to keep an eye on you!�

�Can I have my book back?� was the last thing Roark said.

�In the rear of a pig you can!� the detective thundered at him. And in this one instance, at least, he was neither angelic nor Princetonian in diction. �We�re turning it over to the Vice Squad for further study. See them about it.�

�Bluff,� he admitted when the door had closed. �But I like to see that kind of guy squirm a little.�

The two lawyers were what is known colloquially as a breeze. They just walked through, as stage people say. The detective�s attitude, from what Duane could judge, seemed to be that they both knew the law too well to try to monkey around with anything like murder. Their own professional experience had taught them that you can�t win. They weren�t fools enough to cut their own throats that way. He treated both with lip-respect but with very obvious personal disapproval, because of the short cut by which they had sought to get around the divorce law. He had Arnold in first, then Mrs. Duane�s lawyer.

Nothing of any importance was said.

Arnold had never seen the girl from first to last, not in life, not in death. He had already left the room and gone back to his office, Duane now recalled, before she arrived. Then when he caught up with Duane at the station house for a first consultation, she was already at the city morgue.

Kevin Cronin�s story was substantially that which the girl had told Duane herself. Her dead husband had been his client; after his death Cronin had felt sorry for her, given her part-time typing jobs. Then he�d made her this offer to play a divorce dummy from time to time. No pressure had been involved � she had accepted voluntarily.

To this all the homicide man had to say, brittlely, was: �Your motives seem pretty good, counselor. But your methods were a little bit seamy, weren�t they? Wasn�t there a more honorable way you could have helped her?�

�It�s all relative,� was the enigmatic reply. �What�s honorable, what�s dishonorable? I don�t know these things; do you? I think it�s honorable for a young woman to support her baby boy by taking on a job she finds obnoxious, distasteful. More honorable by far than if she did something like this without the pressing need to do it.�

�You can tell he�s a lawyer,� was the homicide man�s summary, glancing over his shoulder as the door closed. �He leaves you all tangled up.� He shook his head, as if to clear it.

�Send the lady in,� was his next directive.

There was only one lady in it, and Duane knew who she must be.

�I�m going to ask you to step inside to the next room,� the detective in charge said to Duane. �She�ll be able to answer my questions more naturally; you�d only make each other self-conscious if you were both in the room at the same time.�

This was the first time he�d asked him to do this, and that spectral question mark in his mind, as before, glowed briefly, then dimmed again.

He went into an adjoining room and they closed the door on him. They did the closing themselves to make sure it was closed. That small detail made him vaguely uneasy; it was too much like being in custody. Well, he was actually, he reminded himself; a thing doesn�t have to have a label to be a fact.

He pulled a straightback wooden chair over by the window and sat down to stare, looking inward more than outward. The window had bars, and it hadn�t been washed in so long that trying to see through it was like looking through a glass of watery milk held up to a dim light. But on the other side he could make out a cross-section of bricks. Once rosy, they were now gray; maybe put there in the Sixties � the last century�s Sixties, not this. He counted them to give himself something to do. Eight rows up and down, and five bricks across in each row.

What could she tell them, anyway? Only that from where she stood he�d been a lousy husband, and that wasn�t what was being investigated. Funny, he thought; if I�d been a better husband and she�d been a better wife, that girl might be alive right now.

�All right, Duane, you can come back,� somebody called through, closed door and all, and he got up, opened the door, and went back in.

The homicide man was just coming back from showing someone to the door. A quite unusual courtesy, around there.

Fancy Dan, the ladies� man, Duane commented to himself, quite unjustly. But the thought of his wife always put a mental chip on his shoulder. That perfume she always used, Dangeureuse, was all over everything.

The homicide man was shading his mouth with the curved edge of his hand, to close off a slow-dying grin.

�What was it, some crack about me?� Duane accused hotly.

�About the girl,� he said deprecatingly. �I have no right to laugh, either. She�s got a sense of humor, though. �She was a good girl, you can count on that. I bet she read her Bible every night. Sure, every night in a different hotel room.��

He sat down and riffled some papers he had been referring to during the last questioning. And when he nudged a paper clip onto the edge of them and gave them a little half fling away from him, Duane somehow knew it meant that person was in the clear.

�Now we have two left. The waiter � and you.�

Duane�s shoulders bunched a little, defensively.

Next he�s going to say, he told himself miserably, Now we have one left � you.

�Bring in Jos�lito Guzman, better known in English as Joey among the hotel bell crew. And bring in the tape you got on that interview. You know the one.�

Something was brought in and parked over in the corner, with a crepe-like black hood draped over it like the ones they sometimes use to cover typewriters.

Duane remembered the face from the brief interlude with the tray that had been swung around in putting it down, and that he had swerved away from to avoid colliding with it. Good-looking face, choir-boy face, badly frightened face.

�My shift start at four. If I do not clock in, I lose my job.�

�You won�t,� was the calm reassurance.

�Or else I lose my whole-day pay, which for me just as bad.�

On this he received no reassurance.

�Now repeat what you�ve already told us once before. We want to check for some little detail that you might have forgotten. Go over it carefully.�

His confidence came back. He became more voluble. Some of the quick Spanish speech-beat slipped over into his English. �Orrai. The bellboy ring down about five fifteen, maybe a little after. The room-service steward set up the tray � rye, White Rock, bucket of ice, two empty glasses. He hand it to me, I take it up there.�

�Who was in the room?�

�Two men.� He turned to look Duane in the face, straight forwardly enough. �This man. And one other man, wearing glasses.�

�No girl?�

He semaphored an emphatic negative with his hands, crossing them over, then spreading them apart. �No girl. Nobody else.�

�Did you come back a second time?�

�I have to bring back change. He gave me ten-dollar bill, and I do not have my tip yet.�

�Who was in there then?�

�Now one man is gone. Now girl is there. This man, he still there.� He nudged toward Duane with his chin.

�Did you see who the girl was?�

�She put magazine up over her face, to keep me from seeing who she is.�

�But you did see who she was?�

�Same girl I see twice before in room.�

The homicide man, for reasons of his own, wanted this clarified. �You mean in that same room?�

�No, no. Different room, different man, but same girl.� And under his breath in his own language he added a reflection that sounded like: �Desgraciada.� Disgraceful one, or disgraced one. Something like that.

�You don�t approve?�

Sullen shrug. �I am not a priest.�

�Could you love a girl like that?�

Duane wondered where the homicide man was going with this � he was so far off-base.

�I have to be crazy,� was the bitter answer.

�Tell me a little more about yourself. Your family background.�

�I come here from Puerto Rico when I am twelve.�

�Your family come with you, or you come alone?�

�They stay down there, but I have uncle who is already here. He have own business in New Jersey, he make good money. They send me to him, so I learn business. I go to night school, and in daytime I work for him in shop. I am�� He reached for a word, found it. ��apprentice.�

�What line of business is this uncle of yours in?�

�He is in shoe business.�

�You mean he repairs shoes, and like that? How can there be much money in�?�

�No, no. He make them. He has little factory.�

�Oh, he�s a shot-manufacturer. I see.�

�Not like big company, big chain. Just small, one-man business, few machines in loft building, to cut lasts, stitch tops to soles��

�Dye?� supplied the homicide man almost unnoticeably.

�Dye,� the waiter replied. �Everything from firs� to las�.�

�Like a small, family-type enterprise?�

�But our people buy from him a lot. He know just what they like, better than some big shoe company.�

�Let�s get back to the girl,� said the homicide man briskly, as though this had all been a side issue, a breathing spell, a chit-chat break. �If you didn�t know her, and she didn�t know you, why did she put a magazine up to screen her face like that, when you stepped in there?�

�Because she have a guilty heart.� He probably means conscience, Duane thought. �She know she should be ashame� to be there. And because she know that, it make her to be ashame�.�

�That won�t wash,� the homicide man told him flatly. �The street doorman held the door open for her when she came in; she didn�t try to hide her face from him. The starter looked right at her as she stood there by the elevator waiting for the car; she didn�t try to hide her face from him. When she got on and told the operator what floor she wanted, he looked right at her too; and she didn�t try to hide her face from him. We�ve checked with all these people. Why were you the only one she tried to hide her face from? Why just you?�

Silence.

�You don�t answer. Then I�ll answer for you. Because you knew her on the outside, you�ve seen her on the outside, gone out with her on the outside�� he produced one of those pauses that are so dramatic at such times ��been in love with her on the outside. And told her you�d rather see her dead than doing what she was doing � on the outside.�

�I din� know her from... from!� the young fellow cried out.

�Oh, yes you knew her from � from. Now you�re starting to tell lies.� The homicide man�s patient air of reproach was almost paternal. �And we�re going to have to keep you from doing that.� He turned to somebody else. �Run the tape of the interview with Mrs. D. Never mind the earlier part of it. Cut in � you know where I mean � where she hears the doorbell ringing next door.�

He cut in a little too soon. A single word came out � meaningless standing alone by itself. He rectified his starting place, moved further along, and the next try hit it on the nose. It started to slither with a hiss as soft as a nylon being shuffled up a woman�s leg.

�One night I heard a continuous ringing at her doorbell. You know how these apartment house walls are, like tissue paper. And the bell battery was right up against my own wall. It was like having a bee in the room with you. I knew she was in there with the baby, and I wondered why she didn�t answer it. It kept on, and kept on, and kept on. Finally I opened my own door a couple of inches, with the chain left on, and peeked out. There was a young man standing there in front of her door. He was holding a bunch of flowers in his hand.

�While I was watching, I saw him give one last push at the bell. It still didn�t get an answer from her. Then he threw the flowers down on the floor, kicked them apart with his foot, stomped all over them, and went away steaming mad.�

Man�s voice: �Would you know him again if you saw him?�

�I most certainly would. He was turning his face every which way, so I got a look at it from all sides. When she came over to see me later on, after the coast was clear, she told me she�d had to hold her hand over the baby�s mouth the whole time to keep it from cooing or gurgling, and giving her away.�

Man�s voice: �Did she know who was ringing?�

�Of course. She stole a look from the window and saw him come out down below as he was leaving the house.�

Man�s voice: �Did she tell you who?�

�The first thing she told me. She said, �That was Joey again, that room-service waiter down at the hotel.� Those were her very words. She said, �I made the mistake of my life going out with him those couple of times. Now I can�t get rid of him. He not only wants to reform me, he wants to marry me. He thinks I do it for real and not just for legal evidence. I can�t seem to get it through his head�.�

The tape cut off.

�Come inside,� the homicide man said to the waiter. �I want you to stand up for Mrs. Diamond and see if she identifies you.�

There was a taut wait of several minutes, after they�d gone out of the room, that Duane found as nerve-racking and hard to bear as though his own destiny was hanging in the balance, not somebody else�s.

When the homicide man reappeared in the doorway he was alone. Joey the lovelorn had been sidetracked off somewhere.

He made that gesture that has been referred to before, the sign-off, the final one, the climax to it all � the gesture that means it�s all over, like the downturned thumbs of the Romans in the arena � the thumb jerk to the police stenographer. �Inside,� he said, �and bring your pad along. Get ready to take down a confession.�

And in an aside to Duane, as he turned to follow him out, he couldn�t help beaming: �Whoever invented the tape recorder did more for us cops than anyone else since the beginnings of crime, Bertillon included.�

There was another wait, much longer this time, but not as much of a strain.

Duane fiddled with his hands on the table, cracking his finger joints, twirling the ashtray by its edge, first one way then the other. He hadn�t been told he could go, and he was afraid if he got up and tried to, the man who had stayed behind at the table laboriously checking something out, would lift up his head and say, Who told you you could go?

He did lift it finally, as Duane�s restlessness at last penetrated his awareness.

�I�m out of cigarettes,� Duane said lamely.

�I�ll send someone out for you.� He called a uniformed patrolman to the door.

Sheepishly Duane named his brand.

When the man had come back and handed over the pack, Duane asked his table companion behind the back of his hand, �Do you tip a cop when he gets some cigarettes for you?�

�That would be insulting his uniform.� And then the man added with an enigmatic drop of an eyelid, �You�re our guest here.�

To Duane it didn�t sound as convivial as it was meant to.

The homicide man came back in, multiple papers in his hand. �Signed, sealed, and delivered,� he said. �Case closed.�

The humanist in Duane couldn�t help thinking while he watched the homicide man pat his paperwork together: he did his job and did it well. And yet � somebody�s going to have to pay with years of his life for it. Does he have to look so darned serene, even happy, about it?

�I told you the break would come from the outside, at the source,� he said to Duane. �Access and opportunity to possess. I knew it was he the minute he told me his uncle had a shoe-manufacturing plant. This nitrobenzine is used in the dyeing of shoes. He was the only one of the seven could put his fingers on it quickly and without any difficulty. And there�s a switch to it that might interest you a lot.�

�What?�

�He admits he poured the stuff into the bucket of cracked ice, which was pretty soupy by that time anyway. It was you the stuff was intended for, not the girl at all. He�d been out with her two or three times, and he knew she never touched a drop under any circumstances. You were the defiler, so you were supposed to get it. He didn�t count on her dipping the handkerchief in the ice water to make a sort of cold compress of it before pasting it across the upper part of her face.�

�I didn�t notice her do that, myself,� Duane admitted.

�Probably you were too flustered by their knocking on the door right then. She must have done that, because our toxicologist found the handkerchief impregnated with it. How else explain it? Lucky for you that you didn�t take a drink and use that ice, or there would have been a doubleheader in that room.

�The Latins,� he went on, �take their women with an intensity which is almost beyond belief. They�re either all-good or all-bad, all-white or all-black, up on a pedestal or down in the gutter � there�s never any in-between. And you have to compromise, you have to live with the gray, with the in-between, you have to live with life the way it is. He�s not a cold-blooded murderer, he�s a kind of crazy idealist. He�ll probably get an indeterminate sentence.�

Duane was trembling. It could so easily have been himself.

�Have a cup of coffee with us, Mr. Duane, just to show there�s no hard feelings,� the homicide man invited. He was Mr. Duane now that he was in the clear; funny how those things went, he couldn�t help reflecting. If he�d been booked, there�d have been no respectful title.

�I never had coffee in a police station before,� he admitted.

�Well, have some now, then,� he was urged. �It�s on the house.�

When it had been brought in and passed around and siphoned up noisily by lip suction they asked him hospitably, �How is it?�

It was rotten. Rotten was even a compliment to it. It tasted as if somebody�s unwashed socks had been left soaking overnight in the coffee urn. And then a little detergent added to bring out the full bouquet.

Duane didn�t knock it; he was well-mannered that way. He just smiled and swallowed hard to keep it from backing up.

Then he shook hands all around and left.

�Want us to run you home?� the property clerk asked him when he came outside, was given back his belongings, and had signed a receipt.

�I�ll get a taxi,� he said. He�d had enough of the police for one night. Or for one lifetime.

�You may have a hard time getting one around here at this hour,� the deskman called after him as he went out the door. �Most of our traffic is one-way. In. And not by taxi.�

But he didn�t have any trouble. One honked at him impatiently, almost commandingly, just as soon as he had come out on the sidewalk.

�Well, come on, stupid,� a familiar voice called out to him. �Don�t just stand there all night. I want to get home.�

He went up to the door and looked in, and the legal Mrs. Duane was sitting in it, staring at him with what couldn�t exactly be called a melting glance.

�You?� he said bewilderedly. �What do you want now? My right arm? My life�s blood?�

He got in and slammed the door. �Is the divorce off?�

�The S.P.C.A. might object,� she said wearily.

�I thought there was somebody else you were interested in.�

�He�ll keep.�

�He doesn�t come up with fur stoles at the bat of an eyelash. Is that what you mean? There never was a chump like me.�

�Big deal, that mangy thing,� she said scathingly. �It took you so long to clean up the instalments on it that the animal had pups before the pelt was paid for.�

�You must have been pretty sure I�d come out of there, to wait around like this.�

�It figured. You would never be up to killing anybody. It takes a man to do that, not a mush-head like you.�

�Why don�t you turn left there?� he challenged the driver. �Why do you take us all the way over? What are you trying to do, make an extra couple of blocks� fare on your meter?�

She gave her own knees a brush-off of exasperation, to and fro, as if she was dusting them. �Even in a taxi he�s got to back-seat drive! You wouldn�t be able to find your way to Forty-second Street if you were standing on the south side of Times Square.�

�Why don�t you haul your tongue in to half-mast,� he said chivalrously.

They drove away together side by side, husband and wife. They didn�t love each other. They didn�t hate each other either. Not really. They were used to each other. He was a headache, she was a pain. But somebody new might turn out even worse.

Something the homicide man had said inside there a few minutes ago came back to him. You have to compromise, you have to live with the gray, with the in-between, you have to live with life the way it is.

This is the 307th �first story� to be published by Ellery Queen�s Mystery Magazine... and it was quite a story for your Editors to find in the morning mail � we were practically stunned!

At the time Dennis M. Dubin wrote �Elroy Quinn�s Last Case,� he was a senior in New Hyde Park Memorial High School. Dennis is quite a boy! He not only writes detective fiction, he writes for the high school paper, is literary editor of the high school magazine (The Auriga), plays varsity soccer, and still has time for homework, to say nothing of wording three nights a week in a drug store. (Oh, to be young again!)

As you have guessed, Dennis is a mystery fan � no. more properly, he�s a true aficionado. When he was fifteen, he began to collect the �cornerstones� in the Haycraft-Queen Definitive Library. His favorite detective authors make an interesting list, and those mystery writers who do not appeal to him make up an equally interesting list. He particularly likes �to compare detectives, and to discuss them with my mother, who is also a mystery buff and started me off on mysteries in the first place.� (We have had the pleasure of talking with Mrs. Dubin; she told us she has read EQMM since Volume One, Number One.)

Dennis described his letter to us as �talking my heart out to another real mystery buff, especially the creator of Ellery Queen; if I do not stop now, l will write an 8000-word essay!�

Dennis plans to go to college, and although he is interested in all the sciences and might become a biologist or chemist, his present vocational goal is psychology. His �first story� reveals that young Dennis is already a shrewd and practical psychologist. We can only warn the other favorite detective-story writers on Dennis� list: Be prepared � young Dennis will undoubtedly ride again!

Sharp shadows were falling through the yellowed slats of the venetian blinds as Elroy Quinn groaned softly and adjusted himself and the book he was reading to take advantage of the failing light. No sooner was he more comfortable than he was startled by the ringing of the telephone. Moving slowly, he got up and groped for the receiver in the dimness. My eyes are worse than ever, Elroy thought grimly. Long ago he had discarded his pince-nez for thicker, stronger lenses. Locating the telephone at last, he put it to his ear with a trembling hand. �Hello?� he said in a low, gentle voice.

�Elroy?� came a firm deep basso in reply.

�Tom, Junior! I haven�t heard from you for a year. Or more. What�s the word in town?�

�The word is crazy. There�s been a peculiar murder, the sort of thing you used to investigate with Dad. Interested?�

Elroy cackled with delight. �What is it, a dying message or a fantastic clue?�

�Could be either or both. Feel up to it? Say yes and I�ll have a car around in half an hour.�

�Yes!� shot back the enthusiastic if quavery reply.

Shortly after Ellery became the sixth member of The Puzzle Club, the President of the United States was proposed for membership...

The Puzzle Club is a congeries of very important people drawn together by unimportant purpose but common passion � to wit, to mystify one another. Their pleasure, in short, is puzzles.

Application is by invitation only, and membership must be won, the applicant having to submit to the Ordeal by Puzzle. If he survives the test, it earns him automatic admission.

Shortly after Ellery became The Puzzle Club�s sixth regular member, it was proposed and unanimously voted to invite the President of the United States to apply for membership.

This was no frivolous motion; the members took their puzzles seriously, and the President was known to be a devotee of mysteries in all lawful forms. Besides, the Club�s founder and First Member, multimillionaire oil man Syres, had been buddy-buddy with the occupant of the White House since their youthful days as riggers in the Texas oilfields.

The invitation went to Washington, and rather to Ellery�s surprise the President promptly accepted the challenge. In deference to affairs of state, he was urged to designate his own date, which he did; but when Ellery arrived at Syres�s Park Avenue penthouse on the appointed evening to find the membership assembled, he was greeted with gloomy news. The President regretted that he could not make it after all. A Secret Service man, just departed, had brought the message that a crisis in Asia had caused a last-minute cancellation of the President�s flight to New York.

�What shall we do now?� asked Darnell, the famous criminal lawyer.

�There�s no point in wasting the puzzle we�ve prepared for the President,� said Dr. Vreeland, the well-known psychiatrist. �Let�s save it for whenever he can get here.�

�It�s too bad Dr. Arkavy is still attending that symposium in Moscow,� said wispy little Emmy Wandermere, the poet. Dr. Arkavy was the Nobel Prize-winning biochemist. �He has such a fertile mind, he can always come up with something on the spur of the moment.�

�Maybe our newest member can help us out,� said their Texan host. �What do you say, Queen? You must have a hundred problems at your fingers� ends, from your long experience as a writer and a detective.�

�Let me think.� Ellery cogitated. Then he chuckled. �All right. Give me a few minutes to work out the details...� It took him far less. �I�m ready. I suggest we engage in some collective improvisation, to begin with. Since this is going to be a murder mystery, we will obviously require a victim. Any suggestions?�

�A woman, of course,� the lady poet said at once.

�Reeking of glamor,� said the psychiatrist.

�That,� said the criminal lawyer, �would seem to call for a Hollywood movie star.�

�Good enough,� Ellery said. �And a glamor girl of the screen calls for a glamorous name. Let�s call her... oh, Valetta Van Buren. Agreed?�

�Valetta Van Buren.� Miss Wandermere considered. �Yes. She personifies sex in her roles � a smoky witch with enormous cold, full-moon eyes. Does that follow, Mr. Queen?�

�Perfectly. Well, Valetta is in New York to attend the premiere of her latest picture and to do the circuit of TV appearances in promotion of it,� Ellery went on. �But this hasn�t proved an ordinary publicity tour. In fact, Valetta has had a frightening experience. It so shook her up that she wrote me an agitated letter about it which, by the magic of coincidence, I received just this morning.�

�In which,� Dr. Vreeland pressed, �she said��

�That during this New York visit she permitted herself to be squired about town by four men��

�Who are all, naturally, in love with her?� asked the lady poet.

�You guessed it, Miss Wander-mere. She identified the four in her letter. One is that notorious man-about-town and playboy, John Thrushbottom Taylor the Third � and if you haven�t heard of Mr. Taylor, it�s because I just made him up. The second is that wolf � in both senses � of Wall Street, named... well, let�s call him A. Palmer Harrison. The third, of course, is the latest rage among society portrait painters, Leonardo Price. And the last of the quartet is � let�s see � Biff Wilson, the professional football player.�

�A likely story,� grinned Oil Man Syres.

�Now.� Ellery made a professional bridge of his fingers. �Having named the four men for me, Valetta went on to say that yesterday all four proposed marriage to her � each of them, on the same day. Unhappily, our ineffable Valetta felt nothing for any of them � nothing permanent, at any rate. She rejected all four impartially. It was a busy day for Miss Van Buren, and she would have enjoyed it except for one thing.�

�One of them,� said the criminal lawyer, �turned ugly.�

�Exactly, Darnell. Valetta wrote me that three of them took their turndowns with approximate grace. But the fourth flew into a homicidal rage and threatened to kill her. She was terrified that he would try to carry out his threat and asked me to get in touch with her at once. She felt reluctant to go to the police, she wrote, because of the bad publicity it would bring her.�

�What happened then?� asked Syres.

�I phoned, of course,� Ellery replied, �as soon as I finished reading her letter. Would you believe it? I was too late. She was murdered last night, a short time after she must have mailed the letter. So the screen has lost its sexiest pot, and millions of red-blooded Americans at this very moment are mourning the sheer waste of it all.�

�How,� asked Darnell, �was the foul deed done?�

�I could tell you,� Ellery said, �that she was done in by a Tasmanian yoyo, but I won�t be unfair � the nature of the weapon is irrelevant. However, I will say this, to avoid complications: Valetta was murdered by the suitor who threatened her life.�

�And is that all?� asked the tycoon.

�No, I�ve saved the kicker for last, Mr. Syres. Valetta�s letter gave me one clue. In writing about the four men, she said that she�d noticed she had something in common with three of the four, and that the fourth was the one who had threatened her.�

�Oh,� said Dr. Vreeland. �Then all we have to establish is the nature of the common denominator. The three sharing it with Valetta would be innocent. By elimination, therefore, the one left over has to be the guilty man.�

Ellery nodded. �And now � if my initiation at the last meeting was a criterion � the floor is open. Any questions?�

�I take it,� the lady poet murmured, �that we may disregard the obvious possibilities of connection � that Valetta and three of the men were of the same age, or had the same color hair, or the same religious affiliation, or came from the same town or state, or attended the same college, or were investors or board members in the same corporation � that sort of thing?�

Ellery laughed. �Yes, you may disregard those.�

�Social position?� the multimillionaire ventured. �Three of the men you described � Playboy John Something Taylor, Wall Street man A. Palmer Harrison, Portrait Painter Price � did they all come from high society? That probably wouldn�t be true of the pro football player, What�s-His-Name.�

�It just happened,� Ellery mourned, �that Portrait Painter Price was born in a Greenwich Village pad. And Valetta, of course, hailed from the slums of Chicago.�

They pondered.

�Had three of the four men ever served with Valetta,� asked Darnell suddenly, �on the same jury?�

�No.�

�On a TV panel show?� asked the poet quickly.

�No, Miss Wandermere.�

�Don�t tell me,� said Dr. Vreeland, smiling, �that Valetta Van Buren and three of her suitors at one juncture in their lives shared the same psychiatrist�s couch?�

�That�s a good solution, Doctor. But it�s not the solution I have in mind.�

�Politics,� the oil man said. �Valetta and three of the suitors are registered in the same party.�

�My information, Mr. Syres,� said Ellery, �is that Valetta was an incorrigible Democrat, the playboy and the Wall Street men are conservative Republicans, and Price and Biff Wilson never voted in their lives.�

Miss Wandermere suddenly said, �It isn�t anything like that. Am I right, Mr. Queen, in assuming that all the relevant facts were given to us in the body of your story?�

�I wondered when someone was going to ask that.� Ellery chuckled. �That�s exactly so, Miss Wandermere. There�s really no need to ask questions at all.�

�Then I for one need more time,� said the tycoon. �What about the rest of you?� At their abstracted nods their host rose. �Then let�s make an exception tonight and eat Chariot�s exquisite dinner before we crack Queen�s puzzle.�

Miss Wandermere�s shocking blue eyes sparkled with enlightenment during Chariot�s moussaline de saumon. Darnell�s mustache-sized brows lifted with elation over the supr�mes de volaille aux hu�tres. Dr. Vreeland uttered his self-congratulatory exclamation at the serving of the selle de veau � l�Orientale. And their host, Syres, achieved sweet victory over his charlotte Chantilly. But no one uttered a word until they were seated about the drawing room again over espresso and brandy.

�I detect from this and that,� Ellery said, �that none of you encountered any real difficulty with my little puzzle.�

�It�s too bad the President had to miss this,� Syres roared. �It was made to order, Queen, for his type of mind! Are you all quite ready?�

There was a universal nod.

�In that case,� Ellery said, with resignation, �which of Valetta�s four swains murdered her?�

�Females first, always,� said Dr. Vreeland with a gallant nod to Miss Wandermere.

�The key to the answer,� said the lady poet promptly, �consists in the fact, Mr. Queen, that you really told us just one thing about Valetta and her four suitors. It follows that whatever she and three of the four men had in common must relate to that thing.�

�A logic I can�t dispute,� murmured Ellery. �And that thing was?�

Darnell grinned. �What the anticipation of the President�s visit here tonight suggested to you when we asked for an impromptu puzzle. Their names.�

�You named the movie star Valetta Van Buren,� said Syres. �Van Buren � the name of a President of the United States.�

�Then Playboy John Thrushbottom Taylor the Third,� said the psychiatrist. �You buried that one, Queen! But of course Taylor is the name of a President of the United States, too � Zachary Taylor.�

�And the Wall Street man, A. Palmer Harrison,� the lawyer said. �Harrison � William Henry. Also Benjamin.�

�And professional football player Biff Wilson.� Miss Wandermere twinkled. �That �Biff� was masterly, Mr. Queen. But � of course, Wilson, for Woodrow Wilson.�

�And that leaves one character whose name,� said the oil man, �bears no cross-reference to a President�s name � Leonardo Price. So Price, the portrait painter, murdered Valetta. You almost had me fooled, Queen. Taylor, Van Buren, Harrison! That was tricky, picking the more obscure Presidents.�

�You could hardly expect me to name one of my characters Eisenhower,� Ellery grinned. �Which reminds me.� He raised his brandy snifter. �Here�s to our absent President � and may he turn out to be the next member of The Puzzle Club!�

This is the 308th �first story� to be published in Ellery Queen�s Mystery Magazine... a story of special interest to every father and mother who have children of teen age...

The author, Shirley Wallace, is in her early forties, the mother of three, the wife of a director of engineering in an electronics firm. Before marriage, Shirley Wallace was a newspaperwoman (Newark Evening News, New Jersey), a news writer for the OWI in World War II, and head of the news desk in Italy for the USIS (U.S. Information Service). Now, besides being a mother and wife, she is �exhaustively� active in community affairs; but she warns other would-be writers: don�t even dream that you�d really write if only you could quit the PTA and other organizational work; if you really want to write you will � no matter what... We couldn�t agree more.

Richmond Harris was an intellectual, a tall lanky man in his early forties with hair just starting to recede from a high forehead and sleepy eyes in a finely molded face. Despite his usually calm mien, his social reserve, he was a man with strong hidden drive. He had made a great deal of money in his profession and was highly respected in the community of Brookton. Anyone there would have said that Richmond Harris was not the kind of man who could kill another human being.

But today Harris was in a strange town. He sat stiffly in an uncomfortable chair in a strange room in a very old building. He stared silently at this burly, middle-aged, surprisingly distinguished-looking villain sitting arrogantly in the padded swivel chair across from him, and he decided with icy calm that in a very few minutes he would murder the man.

Harris gave himself the few minutes because he was an intellectual. It was necessary for him, as a logical, emotionally stable, moral human being to review his motives and plan his method.

He glanced at Rich, Jr., bound to the armchair with more than fear, and his carefully repressed fury almost broke through. He tore his eyes away from his son. The surging ache somewhere deep in his chest might undermine his resolution. His son was perspiring, his face reflected his deep despair, his eyes were stricken � but they hadn�t hurt him physically. Rich, Jr. was seventeen, almost a man.

Harris closed his eyes, swallowed hard, and tried not to see the boy as he had been just yesterday, when they had started off on this trip to a strange town. Rich � tall, lanky, with finely molded features � was a young carbon copy of himself; he was still apple-cheeked, despite his weekly shave, still shy with strangers, still too optimistic about life and too exuberant at home, like a Great Dane puppy � but he was smart as a whip, and it would show some day when he settled down, maybe next year, in college.

Harris found his motive for the killing quite simply, and in one piece. He remembered the inane question that Julie, his wife, had put to him years ago.

They had had no children then, although Julie was pregnant with Rich. And one night in their bedroom, just after they�d turned out the lights, she had asked suddenly, �Richmond, would you kill for me?�

He ascribed the discussion that followed to her pregnancy, to Julie�s need for extra security � the way other pregnant women simply asked for anchovies in the middle of the night.

But she had gone to sleep content. He�d finally told her yes, there was one circumstance in which he would kill � to protect her or their children.

Still later, with his arm about her swollen waist, thinking about it himself, he felt a fierce, hot anger at any who would dare to threaten her or their children to come. He decided then, and for the rest of his life, that should the time ever come he would kill, and kill gladly.

Harris opened his eyes and looked at this overbearing bully, this blackguard, this inhuman specimen of humanity who was putting them through all this. Their tormentor wasn�t solely to blame, but he was the top man, the head of the whole gang of them. And Harris realized that it was his and Rich�s own fault, in the first place, for having been so naive, so unwary about this setup, that they�d been maneuvered into a terrible trap.

But no matter now; one thing he was sure of � he must defend his son. There was no stronger, no more moral motive in the universe than this � to protect your child.

Should he act now? Could this well-dressed, smug, supercilious character really deliver the final blow to his son? The scoundrel had hardly stopped talking � no, threatening � since he had lured them into this room. Up to now, since neither Harris nor his son had been able to produce what this devil incarnate expected, he�d really been toying with them, concentrating on young Rich as the vulnerable one � trick questions, sly insults, irony, insinuations, all perfectly clear to both of them. No matter what Harris and his son tried from now on, it was too late. Rich, Jr. just wasn�t going to make it. In desperation Harris had thought of offering a large sum of money, under the guise of a gift, of mentioning his influential friends, even of pleading. But he knew in his heart that nothing would help.

Harris turned for the last time to his son � to estimate how much more he could take. The boy was white-faced. He�d obviously lost all hope. He sat rigid, only his fingers writhing as he clasped and unclasped his hands. When he was given a chance to speak he mumbled or stuttered � he could make no impression in this kind of situation. Both realized that the man facing them had them by their throats and knew it. This was his stamping ground, he held the whip, he would make the final decision.

But no, Harris thought. This is my son. If I move now�

Harris paused on the brink of action. He struggled with the instinct to kill. What was the matter with this man? Couldn�t even his insensitive mind foresee what Rich would some day become? Would this evil man really eliminate so much promise, so much potential? Was there no speck of pity in the man that he should choose this vile manner of destruction, face to face, with such utter callousness, permitting no recourse for his victim?

Rich, Jr. shot him an agonized glance. Under the harsh, ego-destroying, hammering voice of their Inquisitor he could hear the boy�s silent, pitiful plea, �Help me, Dad.�

Then suddenly � Harris named him clearly in his mind � the assassin stood up and moved toward the boy. Their time had run out.

Civilization dropped from Harris in an instant. He jumped to his feet. He rushed to his son and with one deft, desperate clutch had him out of the chair and stumbling toward the door. As he threw the door open and pushed Rich safely through, he heard a gasp behind him.

Harris turned slowly, with a terrible calm. The blood rushed through his veins in icy fury, for now as far as he was concerned his adversary was weaponless. Others might cringe helplessly before this arbiter of their fates, but not this father.

As the man stood before him, shocked by the violence and speed of his move, Harris raised his head high � and destroyed him.

�Dean Sonderfield,� he said, �after your inept, imperceptive, murderous interview here today, I wouldn�t have my son attend this university even if you did accept him!�

He closed the door to the Admissions Office firmly behind him, and Richmond Harris and his grateful son left the ivy-covered building forever.

We are delighted to welcome Celia Fremlin to EQMM. Her first appearance is an unusual story, one of the five winners of Second Prizes in the EQMM-CWA (Crime Writers Association) short-story contest...

Celia Fremlin was raised in the little Kentish village of Ryarsh. She won a scholarship to Somerville College, Oxford, where she received a B.A. and a B. Litt. In 1959 her novel, THE HOURS BEFORE DAWN, won the Mystery Writers of America �Edgar� for the best mystery novel of the preceding year. Her other novels include WAIT FOR THE WEDDING, THE TROUBLE MAKERS, and THE JEALOUS ONE.

And now we give you Miss Fremlin�s unusual prize-winning story � unusual, you will see, for EQMM too. �The Special Gift� has an Alice-in-Wonderland quality of quiet terror: be prepared for a cauld grue, for a frisson d�horreur...

Eileen glanced disconsolately at the little group cowering round the fire in her big, cold sitting room. Only five of them tonight. It was the weather, of course, that was keeping most of the members away; not everyone was willing to battle through wind and sleet just for the pleasure of reading aloud to one another their amateur attempts at writing, and receiving some equally amateur criticism.

Still, thought Eileen, drawing her cardigan more tightly about her, it was a pity; these meetings weren�t nearly so much fun with only a few. A crowd might have made it seem a bit warmer, too.

�Well, do you think we ought to begin, Mr. Wilberforce?� she said, sitting down on the big horsehair ottoman next to the secretary.

Mr. Wilberforce, a plump, important-looking man in his fifties, glanced at the clock, rubbing his pink hands together.

�Only twenty past,� he said. �Better give them a few more minutes. The snow, you know � buses��

�I think we should start,� piped up old Mrs. Peterkin, peering out like a little aggrieved mouse from the depths of the fur coat she had refused to take off. �We�ve got a lot to get through this evening. I�ve brought one of my little tales of unrequited love, if you�d care to hear it. And I�m sure Miss Williams here� � she indicated a pleasant, vacantly smiling girl on her right � �I�m sure Miss Williams has brought us another chapter of her psychological novel. And Mr. Walters� � the pale young man lowered his eyelashes self-consciously � �we hope Mr. Walters is going to read us another of his Ballads of the Seasons. It�ll be summer this time, won�t it, Mr. Walters?�

�Yes, it will be summer,� agreed Mr. Walters, speaking rapidly and staring at the carpet. �But not summer in the conventional sense, you understand. Now, my interpretation of summer��

A sharp, imperative ring at the front door brought Eileen to her feet, and she hurried eagerly out of the room. One more makes six, she was thinking, that�s not too bad; all the same, I wish I hadn�t made all those cheese sandwiches...

A gust of wind and snow swirled into her face as she opened the front door, and the little dark man seemed almost to be blown in by it, so slight and thin in his dark coat.

�You haven�t been to these meetings before, have you?� Eileen was beginning � and then stopped, for in the dimness of the hall the stranger seemed to be staring at her with a delighted recognition.

�We... we haven�t met before, have we?� she went on awkwardly; and the little man seemed to rouse himself.

�Why... er... no,� he said hastily, shaking the snow from his boots onto the doormat. �No, indeed, I assure you! I just... well, I had a feeling��

Again he stared at her with that odd look of recognition in his eyes; and for some reason Eileen began to feel uncomfortable; for some reason she became very eager to escape the piercing gaze of this stranger in the dimly lit hall.

�Come along and meet the others,� she said nervously, and led him briskly into the sitting room.

�Fitzroy is my name,� the dark man introduced himself. �Alan Fitzroy.�

He glanced round the company with dark, sparkling eyes, and there was a little stir of interest. Not that anybody had ever heard of him, but something in the way he spoke made them feel that perhaps they ought to have heard of him. Perhaps, each of them was thinking, perhaps this at last is the real writer I have always hoped would turn up! The real writer who not only gets his own work published, but who will be able to tell me how to get mine published; who will recognize it as the fine work it really is...

With such thoughts behind them, five pairs of eyes followed the little man as he moved toward the fire; eager hands drew up a comfortable armchair for him; eager voices plied him with questions.

But Alan Fitzroy was not very communicative. No, he didn�t know any of the members of this group. No (modestly) he didn�t write much � well, not very much. No, he hadn�t brought anything to read � well, not really � anyway, let everyone else read something first, please!

And so the meeting began. Alan Fitzroy sat motionless, his eyes closed. To everyone�s disappointment he took no part in the comments and criticisms that followed each reading, and it was only when he was asked for his contribution that he roused himself.

�Well,� he admitted, �I have brought a little thing. Actually, it�s part of a larger work. I�m writing my autobiography, you see.�

He looked round the room expectantly, and there was an almost audible sigh of disappointment. This, somehow, didn�t sound like a real writer; it sounded much more like an ordinary member of the group. However�

�I want you to understand,� the stranger continued, �that the whole object of my book is to bring the reader into real contact with my ego � to draw him, or her, into the life of my mind in a way which I believe has never been done before...�

As he spoke, he fixed his brilliant eyes on Eileen�s face, and again she felt a little flicker of uneasiness � or was it even fear? Quite irrational, anyway, she assured herself; there couldn�t possibly be a more harmless little man; and she settled herself to listen as he began to read from a thick, dog-eared manuscript.

�The self-doubt and self-awareness of any repressed, frustrated childhood...�

The voice went on and on. At intervals Eileen glanced at the clock. She hoped that Mr. Fitzroy wouldn�t be offended if she went out and made the tea before he had finished. She hoped, too, that he hadn�t noticed that Mrs. Peterkin was asleep inside her fur coat and might at any moment begin to snore.

Mr. Wilberforce, at Eileen�s side, was fiercely making notes on the back of one of his own manuscripts. No doubt he was building up a pungent criticism of the weary verbiage through which this poor little man was plowing.

�Go easy with him!� whispered Eileen softly; somehow it seemed very important to her that nothing should be said to upset the newcomer. �Remember he�s new.� But Mr. Wilberforce only nodded his head irritably and went on writing.

Wasn�t it ever coming to an end? But listen! At last! Those, surely, must be the concluding sentences:

�To point the significance of these psychodynamic disturbances to my infantile ego, I must relate a nocturnal hallucination from which I used to suffer. Or, in common parlance, a dream. I dreamed I was walking along a passage, a long stone passage, my feet clanging as I went, as if I were wearing boots of steel or armor or something like that. At the end of the passage I knew I should find my cradle � the cradle I�d had as a baby � and I should have to get into it and lie down. And I knew that as I lay there, I would see a face slowly rising over the side of the cradle, and the face would be mad. I never knew what would happen next, because I always woke up � in fact, I always woke up before I had even reached the end of the passage.�

Abruptly the little man laid down his manuscript. He looked round triumphantly, and there was a little embarrassed silence, broken by a snore from Mrs. Peterkin.

�Well,� said Eileen at last, wondering how to avoid hurting the little man�s feelings. �It�s a very profound piece of work, of course��

�But it�s too long!� exploded Mr. Wilberforce. �And too self-centered, too self pitying! You�ve used the word �I� eighty-seven times in the first six pages! I was counting!�

Alan Fitzroy turned on him indignantly.

�But I have to use the word �I�! The whole book is about myself � I told you! The idea is to get the reader involved with me � to bring him right into my very mind, if you understand me��

�I understand you perfectly,� said Mr. Wilberforce heavily, ignoring Eileen�s nudges. �The idea is far from being a novel one. But if you will allow me to say so, I think you are deceiving yourself. You speak of bringing the reader right into your mind, and in fact you don�t even interest him. The whole thing is too wordy, too abstract. There�s nothing in it to grip the attention.�

The little man flushed angrily.

�Nothing to grip the attention?� he cried. �What about that dream, eh? Doesn�t that grip your attention? Doesn�t it?�

�Frankly, no,� answered Mr. Wilberforce. �It�s simply an account of a childish nightmare such as all of us have had at one time or another. I appreciate that it may have fright-need you as a child, but believe me, it won�t frighten anyone else!�

The little man was trembling with rage now.

�It will frighten people!� he almost screamed. �It will! I have a special gift for this sort of thing, I know I have! Let me tell you, a person once died of fright from hearing that dream!�

There was an awkward little silence. No one knew what to say to that absurd boast. Eileen got hastily to her feet.

�I think we all need a cup of tea!� she said, loudly and brightly, and escaped from the room. As she hurried down the passage to the kitchen, she became aware that Audrey Williams, the young psychological novelist, was following her.

�Thought I might help you, dear,� explained Audrey, and added, as she piled cups and saucers onto a tray, �Whoever is that pompous little ass, do you suppose?�

�I can�t think,� said Eileen. �I felt rather sorry for him, really. He must have worked terribly hard on all that stuff, you know. He had chapters and chapters of it written.�

�You�re telling me!� giggled Audrey. �I thought at one point that he was proposing to read the whole lot! I nearly died...� Her voice trailed away, and both women were aware of Alan Fitzroy standing silently in the doorway.

�Funny you should say that,� he said, looking straight at Audrey. �And you?� he went on, turning to Eileen. �Did you nearly die, too?�

Eileen flushed. No wonder the poor little chap was bitter! It was shameful of Mr. Wilberforce to have laced into a newcomer like that!

She said gently, �Don�t take too much notice of Mr. Wilberforce. He�s a very stern critic. He�s like that to all of us sometimes, isn�t he, Audrey?�

Audrey Williams nodded dumbly; and Alan Fitzroy spoke again, addressing himself to Eileen.

�And what did you think of my little effort? I sense a certain sympathy in you. Were you impressed by my dream?�

�Why � yes�� lied Eileen nervously, searching for words. �I thought it was quite � well, quite unusual. If you�d brought it in a bit sooner, though, instead of quite so much theory in the beginning��

�But I do bring it in sooner!� exclaimed the little man eagerly � he seemed to have quite recovered his temper. �I bring it in all through the book � just as it has come to me at intervals all through my life. But the reader doesn�t know why I keep repeating it until the last episode! Don�t you think that�s a good idea? Keeping him in suspense, that kind of thing?�

He glanced with pathetic eagerness from one to the other of the two women; and Eileen, anxious to show the poor fellow a little encouragement, paused in fanning biscuits on a plate to say, �Do tell us: what is the last episode?�

�Oh, well, you see, it was like this. This dream used to worry me, it really did. I�m not a nervous man � that is to say, my type of nerves, as I explain in��

Hastily Eileen brought him back to the point.

�But the dream?� she said, counting out teaspoons onto the tray, and Alan Fitzroy continued, �Yes, yes. The dream. What worried me, you see, was that each time I dreamed it I got little farther down the passage toward the cradle, where I knew I would have to lie down and see the Face. In the end I was so worried about it that I told my wife. �If only you could be with me, my dear,� I said � just in fun, you understand � �Then I wouldn�t be so scared.�

�Well, that very night I dreamed it again, and, believe it or not, she was there! She was walking along in front of me, wearing her old dark dressing gown. She was a big woman, my wife � a big strong woman, and she quite blocked my view of the cradle � the cradle where I knew the madness would begin. So I felt quite safe. I didn�t mind the dream a bit. And when I woke up��

The little man looked eagerly from Eileen to Audrey, like a conjuror bringing off a successful trick. �When I woke up, what do you think my wife told me?�

�Why, that she�d had the dream too, of course!� said Audrey promptly � wasn�t that the obvious climax to the tale?

But Alan Fitzroy shook his head. �No,� he said. �No, that didn�t come till later. No, she told me that as she lay there, her head near to mine, she heard what she thought was my watch ticking under my pillow. But a funny, metallic tick, she said � like a far-off clanging of armor, or of steel boots. And then she knew that it didn�t come from under the pillow but from inside my head. It was my boots clanging in my dream, you see, and she�d heard them.�

Eileen and Audrey had drawn close together. Eileen�s voice trembled a little.

�I think we ought to take the tea in�� she began; but the little man laid his hand on her arm beseechingly.

�Just one moment more!� he begged. �Just a few more words! After that, whenever I dreamed that dream, my wife would hear the clanging in my head, louder each night, until at last she had the dream, too! The clanging somehow forced her to go to sleep, she told me, though she tried hard to stay awake � and there she was, she said, right in my dream, walking down the passage in front of me, bearing my boots clanging behind her. What do you think of that?�

Eileen had recovered herself. Of course, this was just a piece of fiction on which he wanted her opinion. Mr. Wilberforce�s crushing comments on the autobiography had stung him into trying to enliven it.

�Well,� she said consideringly. �I suppose you could work that up into something quite dramatic. But however would you end it?�

�The way it did end, of course!� said the little man sharply. �It ended with my wife actually getting into the cradle. Naturally. It was my dream, wasn�t it, and I made it end that way. Though there were one or two terrible struggles first. I told you, my wife was a big strong woman.�

�And... and what happens to her in it?� asked Eileen. �Does she see the face? And does she tell you afterwards what it was like?�

�Oh, no!� said the little man, sounding surprised. �Of course not. She couldn�t tell me any more after she�d got into the cradle. Naturally. She wasn�t dead, but she was an imbecile by then. I found her in bed in the morning, all curled up as she would have to be to fit into this little cradle, and she could no longer talk. Naturally. That would be the effect of looking at the Face.�

Eileen and Audrey glanced at each other. Each noticed that the other had gone rather white; but the little man went cheerfully on, apparently unaware of their dismay.

�They took her away, of course, and put her into some sort of home. But it was all right � I knew I was safe now, because if she was in the cradle, then of course I couldn�t be, could I? Every time I had the dream there she was, filling up the whole cradle in her dark dressing gown so that I couldn�t even see it. I felt wonderfully safe for months.

�Until, one night, she wasn�t there any more. That was terrible for me. I knew then she must be dead � and sure enough the next day I had word from the Home that this was the case. But come�� he seemed suddenly to rouse himself � �I mustn�t keep you ladies from your tea � allow me!� And taking one of the two trays he hurried off to the sitting room.

Eileen and Audrey had only one thought � to get back to their companions. Hastily they loaded the other tray and a few moments later they were in the sitting room.

To their surprise Alan Fitzroy was no longer there.

�Oh, he left as soon as he�d brought the tray in,� explained Mr. Wilberforce. �Said he had to catch a train to Guildford, or somewhere. Asked me to apologize to you � why, what�s the matter with you?�

Eileen recounted briefly the story that Alan Fitzroy had told them in the kitchen, and Mr. Wilberforce looked grave.

�Fellow must be crazy!� he said. �I thought he looked funny. Wouldn�t have let him go if I�d known. Should have kept him, and rung the police.�

�Oh, I�m only too thankful he has gone!� said Eileen. �I don�t want a fuss. Besides, he must have meant it as fiction � though even so, he must be a hit abnormal to try��

�Abnormal? Of course he was abnormal!� interrupted old Mrs. Peterkin. �I could see that the very first moment! �That�s an Egalomaniac!� I said to myself��

�Egomaniac,� corrected Audrey Williams, who was well up in the jargon needed for her novel. �Or do you mean megalomaniac�?�

The chatter went on, and the clink of tea cups, and Eileen felt more and more thankful that the strange little man had gone. Suppose he had been the last to go instead of the first? She couldn�t very well have forced him out�

Eleven o�clock now. One by one the members left, and finally Eileen was alone.

�I must get all this cleared up,� she thought, glancing wearily round the untidy room; and she began to move about collecting ashtrays and dirty cups. As she passed the ottoman she noticed that Mr. Wilberforce had left his gloves there; and so she was not surprised when a moment later the front doorbell rang urgently.

But it was not Mr. Wilberforce. The little dark figure had slipped past her into the hall before she had properly taken in what was happening.

She gave a little gasp of horror � and then recovered herself. After all, he seemed a very innocuous little man, standing there under the hall light and asking if he could look at a timetable. He had missed his last train, he said, but maybe � on the other line � perhaps a connection at Croydon � if he might just study the timetable a moment?

Eileen had no alternative but to lead him into the sitting room and hand him the ABC. He settled himself in the armchair with it and was soon thumbing through its pages with apparent concentration. Eileen went on with her tidying, trying to appear quite unperturbed. After all, she was saying to herself, what can he do? I�m twice his size, a big strong woman�

Where had she heard that phrase before? The words echoed in her head � �My wife... a big strong woman.�

It was then that she noticed how quiet everything was. The rustling of the pages of the ABC had ceased; and when she looked across at him, Eileen saw that Alan Fitzroy was asleep. His head was leaning back against the chair, his mouth was open, and his face was rather white.

�He looks queer!� she thought, stepping closer. �I think perhaps I will ring the police. Luckily the phone�s in the kitchen, not in here, so it won�t wake him��

And then she heard the noise. At first she thought it was a clicking in his throat, the prelude to a snore. But no, it wasn�t a click; it was a tiny clanking noise � distant � metallic � inside his head.

Eileen did not stop to put down the tray she was carrying. The telephone! The telephone! That was the only idea in her mind as she hurried through the door and started for the kitchen.

But how loud the clanking sound had grown! It seemed to be following her out of the room � along the passage � clank � clank � CLANK�

And where was the kitchen? How had this passage grown so long? And why were the walls of stone, and the floor too � stone that echoed to the clanking footsteps behind her�

She could not look behind. She could only hurry on, and on and on, down the echoing passage, until in front of her she saw the end. The delicate muslin frills, stirred ever so slightly by an unseen breath. The lacy pillow, white and waiting. The coverlet, just recently turned back, in readiness, by an unseen hand.

With a strength she never knew she possessed, Eileen made herself stand still.

�It�s a dream, it�s a dream!� she told herself. �If I won�t go with it, I�ll wake up! I won�t go with it! I won�t! I won�t! I won�t!�

The clanking feet behind came nearer. Hands were pushing-pushing � fighting with her, and Eileen fought back � with that dim, strengthless fighting of dreams, which yet somehow takes all a person�s strength and more � I won�t! gasped Eileen silently. I won�t, I won�t, I won�t!

A crash seemed to split her eardrums, and she found she could open her eyes. She opened them on her own kitchen, on the tray of crockery lying smashed at her feet. Sweat was running down her face, and tears of relief came into her eyes.

A dream, of course! A sleepwalking dream brought on by that awful little man, and perhaps by over-tiredness. Why, it must have been part of the dream that he ever came back to ask for a timetable at all! Light-hearted in her relief, Eileen hurried back to the sitting room.

No. That at least hadn�t been a dream. But Alan Fitzroy was no longer sitting upright in his chair. He was sprawled on the floor as if he had been struck down in a violent fight, and blood was trickling from his head where it had struck the fireplace fender in his fall.

For one insane moment Eileen thought of that dream struggle at the edge of the cradle � one of them had had to fall � and then, collecting her wits, she rushed to telephone the doctor...

The doctor felt the little man�s pulse, his heart; then he shook his head.

�Not a hope, I�m afraid,� he said. �You�ll have to phone the police, my dear, and get them to find out where he comes from and everything. You go and phone them now, while I attend to the poor fellow.�

But why was Eileen still standing there, motionless?

�Go on � phone!� said the doctor irritably. It was bad enough to be called out to a fatal heart attack at this time of night, without a hysterical woman delaying things. �Go on, the telephone!�

As if in a trance, Eileen moved toward the door � along the passage toward the kitchen. After all, perhaps it had been the doctor�s watch chain making that tiny clanking noise. Yes, he must still be rattling his watch chain now � louder � louder � LOUDER�

Guy Cullingford�s �Something To Get At Quick� is a winner of one of the five Second Prizes awarded in the EQMM-CWA (Crime Writers Association) short-story contest. It is a story of juvenile delinquency in London, and it is told with great understanding and compassion. It moved us, and we hope you will be moved too...

All of us carried knives. You want something you can get at quick if another gang starts in with the rough stuff, and brass knucks and bicycle chains are out. They count against you just as bad and you can�t get rid of �em in a hurry. An empty milk bottle�s fine but not always there when you need it.

No, knives are best. All the same, if it came to a showdown, we never did more than nick a bit of skin here and there, just the same as they did to us. We never meant to use �em to hurt anyone real bad. It was more for the look of it if you know what I mean. Until that night...

We�d been round the pubs and we�d all had a few beers � well, you know what, it was Saturday night and we were flush; and when we came out of The Grapes, we were feeling larky and there were these two girls who�d been hanging around for what they could get � so I reckon it was our turn. It was dark up that end of the street and we�d got them in the middle of us and started to poke at them a bit � nothing rough really � and then someone went a bit further and one of these Judies began to scream as if no one had ever touched her before.

All of a sudden there was this chap turned up from nowhere ready to put on a gallant rescue act. The first we knew, he�d hurled himself at us and was pummeling and kicking as if he was half a dozen and bawling at the top of his voice for help. Being as we had our backs to him and weren�t expecting it, we went down like a bunch of skittles, girls and all, and there we were in a great sprawling heap with this chap somewhere on the top. The Judies screeched in earnest, there was a lot of heavy breathing, and then someone yelled, �Stick him! Stick the interfering son-of-a��

Then just as soon it was all over. We sorted ourselves out and scrambled up somehow, including the girls. Except him. He was down on his knees with his back humped over and his head on the road. At least, that�s what it looked like by the shape; you couldn�t see him that clear, though every door of the pub was open and light was streaming out � and so were the jerks from inside. Someone blew a whistle � the landlord I shouldn�t wonder � and Flip called out, �Scarper, you nits, and ditch the hardware!� and set off running like hell towards home.

So I got off too � we�d always planned to scatter in case of an emergency � and didn�t stop to see what happened to the others. My way home was the same as Flip�s but I didn�t catch up with him as I wasn�t going straight there. Far as I know there was no one after me, but I ran as if there was, and my idea was to make for the river and do what Flip had always said to do. All those streets are badly lighted with patches of dark between one lamppost and the next, but they weren�t like places I�d never been in and I ran like a streak not thinking of anything except the nearest way to the bridge.

I got a stitch in my side like a kid, but I didn�t stop for that. Lucky there was no one about. Saturday night all the people who lived in those rows of houses were either out somewhere or stuck round the telly. But I might have met up with a pair of flatties on the beat or a squad car rushing up Zuppt to the scene of the... well, where it had been happening.

When I came to the bridge I stopped to catch my breath, looked round to see if I was alone, and then let the knife slip over the side to keep company with the fishes. Then I began to wonder what the others had done with theirs, and other things besides. I wondered if we shouldn�t have stayed put to see if the chap was hurt bad. Or maybe�

Funny, but you get into the way of doing what Flip says without any argument � he was always the one to have his say even at school. It was too late to do different, so I went on home, and when I opened the sitting-room door, it was like it always was with the pair of them glued by their noses to the telly and half dark in there same as it was in the streets outside. Whatever it was on the screen, even the commercials, my dad didn�t like to be interrupted, but my mum turned her head towards me and then back again before she said, �Oh, there you are, Bernie. Move round a bit, Jim, let Bernie have a look too. It�s one of those nasty thrillers you like so much, dear.�

But I�d had enough thrillers for one night, so I went up and on to bed.

Old Josiah Schonfeldt was the retired Chief of the Homicide Squad. A reminiscence for a magazine article? Something special? Well, there was the Issachar Lampert case � you remember Issachar Lampert, the Texas oil-and-cattle multimillionaire? No? Well, it happened 20 years ago, and it was the most exciting case in Schonfeldt�s detective career. And it was a baffler, no question about it...

Oh, come on now, young fellow, what is there in a retired Chief of a Homicide Squad worth a magazine article? Oh, sure, I�ve had interesting things happen in the 37 years I was with the force, but most of it was pure routine. Well, if you put it that way, I guess I�m vain enough to tell you about one or two of them. But you�ll have to let me do it my own way � I never was interviewed before, except in the way of business, you might say, by the newspaper boys. Leave your dog in the garden and come in and make yourself comfortable. Let me have your coat.

Well, I guess the case I�ll never forget was the one I called �The Impersonation Murder Case.� I�ll bet you never heard of it � long before your time. But 20 years ago it was a big story, some of which never got in the papers. And that was a case where I really was of some use � anyway, one man thought so, and thinks so yet. I get a dozen bottles of good bourbon from him every Christmas. That reminds me: have a drink? Later, then.

Here, let me show you. I never was stuck enough on myself to keep a scrapbook, but the Missus did, and I can�t claim I ever went out of my way to stop her. See this clipping? Read the headline. ��I Only Did My Duty,� says Schonfeldt.�

This thing started when Issachar Lampert was murdered. Ever hear of him? In his day he was noted for two things � he was the richest man in this state, and the worst-tempered. Everybody kowtowed to him, but everybody hated him � well, maybe not his wife, till she�d been married to him two weeks or so. They had just one child � a son named Gordon � and he never pretended not to hate his father. They were on the outs from the time the kid could walk and talk, and finally when the boy was 20 they had one big bang-up fight and his father ordered him out of the house forever. Yes, like an old melodrama � never darken my door again.

Naturally he was only too glad to go, though he was still at school and had no training to earn a living. He was mad at his mother, too, for not taking his part, so he packed his bags and left, just like that, and vanished into nothingness. She�d have seen that he was well supplied with money if she�d only known where he was: she adored him. But it was 15 years before she knew whether he was alive or dead; and the private detective she hired to try to find him had to give it up as a bad job.

At least that was her story. I have to tell this the way it came to me. Anyway, there was no doubt on earth that her son was the one person she really loved.

Issachar Lampert was found in his study in that big suburban palace they called a house on the morning of November 19th. One of the maids found him � the servants were the only people who got up early in that establishment. She noticed the light under his study door, knocked, got no answer, took a chance on opening it � though all the servants lived in mortal terror of the old man � saw him lying on the floor with his head in a pool of blood, screamed, and fainted.

There was a great hullabaloo, of course, and by the time somebody had wakened Mrs. Lampert and she�d got there, half the staff was at that door, nobody daring to go inside. She did, and knelt down and felt his heart and discovered it was still beating faintly. Somebody�d had the brains to phone their doctor, and he arrived in a few minutes.

Lampert was still alive. He was even conscious, or semi-conscious. For Dr. Harris said that when he asked, �Who did this to you?� the dying man whispered, �It was Gordon.� Nobody else heard him, and right after that Lampert died.

The corner of the steel desk was soaked in blood. There wasn�t a sign of a fingerprint that couldn�t be accounted for. And Gordon Lampert was just as absent from the place as he had been for 15 years. When we got there and I told Mrs. Lampert about the doctor�s statement she said her husband must have been out of his mind, that she hadn�t seen or heard from their son since his father threw him out. I put it to her that perhaps Gordon had come back secretly, seen his father but not her, quarreled with him again, and killed him, but she said it was totally impossible.

�If Gordie had ever thought of coming home,� she said, �and how I�ve wished and praved he would, he�d have got in touch with me first. Besides, I was with Issachar in the study till after midnight, discussing business. I�ve taken an active part in his affairs � it�s all we had in common,� she commented bitterly. �After all, I was head bookkeeper in his first company when we were married, and I�m a substantial stockholder in most of his holdings.

�When I went to bed he said he was going to finish some figures he was working on, and that�s the last I saw or heard of him. We haven�t shared a bedroom for a long time. And that�s all I knew till they woke me around seven in the morning.�

�Well,� I said, �somebody killed him.�

�He had plenty of enemies,� she retorted.

�How could anybody get in? You�ve told me the house is carefully locked up every night, with burglar alarms at every window and door.�

�We�ve got a big staff of servants,� she said.

But though we grilled every one of them to a fare-thee-well, I never figured it was any of them. They all slept in, and they all alibied one another, anyway.

If it wasn�t Gordon, somehow, then it must have been Fern Lam-pert herself, as far as I could see. We kept her under surveillance, but there wasn�t anything else we could do till we could accumulate some direct evidence against her. Multimillionaires don�t get held on suspicion any more than they go to the electric chair.

I was already a Detective Lieutenant then, and I was put in charge of the case. Issachar Lampert was a really big gun locally, and the Commissioner said they needed somebody in command who could be depended on to... well, that�s of no importance. I was given a free hand and every sort of backing, but for almost two weeks we got absolutely nowhere.

Then out of the blue Fern Lampert herself called me up and informed me her son had come home. He was there with her now. He had read of his father�s death in a New York paper and had come right back. Well, that was possible, granting he hadn�t done it himself, because we had kept everything out of the local papers and off the press wires except for the announcement that Lampert had been found dead � which of course he really hadn�t been.

I wasn�t taking any chances. I was out of my office and on my way two seconds after I�d hung up the phone. I took Detective Sergeant Brian Henderson with me � he�s in the department still, and will remember it. I could only hope I�d get to Gordon Lampert before his mother had had time to coach him. If he�d had the nerve to turn up again after murdering his old man, I was sure he�d cook up some kind of alibi with her and claim this was his first appearance in the house in 15 years.

If that was his game, then I was going to tell him outright that it was either him or his mother, and see how that hit him. Maybe he�d let her sacrifice herself to save him � and she�d do it all right, I was sure of that � or maybe he wouldn�t. But that was going to be my first line. Either she was certain he was innocent and could prove it, or they had concocted some story to get him off the hook � or she�d never have told us he was there.

That place sure was a mansion � you could have put my whole house in the room the maid showed us into, and I remember wishing my wife could see it � carpet up to your ankles, all kinds of paintings and statues and silk brocade and whatnot, and big silver and crystal vases of roses that yelled �hothouse� at you. And when the two of them appeared, she was a knockout too. She must have been pushing 60, but she didn�t look an hour over a young 40. As for Gordon, I had pictures of him at 20, but a man of 35 is something else again, and I wondered how even his mother could have recognized him at first sight. All I could say when I saw him was that he and the pictures of him were at best look-alikes.

And you know what? She stared me in the eye and said, �Officer, this is my son. I want you to arrest him for his father�s murder.�

That was the one thing I�d never dreamed of expecting from her! I just stood there with my mouth open, and before I could close it all hell broke loose. First, the guy made a jump for the door, but Henderson tripped him and then got a good hold on him. Then he stopped struggling and yelled, �You can�t do this to me! I�m not her son! Nobody told me the man was murdered!�

�I�m afraid,� said Mrs. Lampert, tears running down her face, �that my poor boy is out of his wits. He has to be put in custody for his own good.

�Don�t be frightened, Gordie,� she said to him. �Everything will be all right. I�ll get you the best lawyer in the city � I�ll get you Matthew Van Druhen himself � and he�ll prove you weren�t responsible and see to it you�re sent to the very best private hospital to get the treatment you need.�

Well, I couldn�t make hide nor hair of it, but all at once the guy turned white and sort of collapsed, and there wasn�t another whimper out of him. I decided the only thing we could do was take him down and book him on suspicion, and at least keep hold of him till we could get things straightened out. I�d been so set for the defensive mother-tiger bit that I just didn�t know what to make of this woman handing over her own son that way.

But before we left she had some more to say.

�He came here this morning � just rang the bell and asked for me. I hardly knew him at first, but he proved to me he was Gordon, after all these years. And I said to him right away, �But my God, Gordie, don�t you know they�re after you for killing your father? You must go away at once � I�ll give you money and help you hide till everything quiets down.�

�And then I realized my poor boy must be mentally ill. All of a sudden he began saying that he wasn�t Gordon � when he�d just proved to me he was � and he launched into some crazy story I couldn�t make any sense out of.

�I was terribly frightened � not for myself, but for him. I knew he must have help at once. I didn�t know what to do � maybe I was wrong, but all I could think of was to call you.�

At that the guy pulled himself together and said, �Officer, this woman is lying. I am not her son, I am not insane, and I never killed anyone. She told me her husband died suddenly, not one word more. And she never told me she had sent for the police.�

�Oh, Gordie, how can you?� Fern Lampert sobbed. �You know perfectly well � and I even told you how Dr. Harris insisted that Issachar had accused you � and how about all your childhood memories � and the birthmark � and��

�Officer, please get me out of here,� he begged. �I can explain everything. But get me away from her!�

That part I agreed with, so we took him away.

Well, how�s that for a start, young fellow? Want me to go on? Okay.

He was only too willing to be booked, even for suspicion of murder. He was bursting with stuff he had to tell us, even though it involved confessing to trying to obtain money under false pretenses, which is a felony. He gave us a long, detailed story, and he repeated it � not word for word, but in substance � to Van Druhen when he arrived, retained by Mrs. Lampert as she had promised. He gave every appearance of believing every word he said. And not one of us bought it as we listened. I know I didn�t, and I found out soon that everyone who heard it, including the lawyer, was absolutely certain we were listening either to the ravings of an unbalanced mind or to a tremendous tissue of lies.

Here, wait till I find it in my scrapbook. I copied it from his signed statement that he made later, and if you want you can copy it from me. Here it is, shaped into police journalese:

Well, you can imagine how that struck us. �Most fantastic alibi I ever heard� � �This guy isn�t loony, he�s just a frustrated novelist� � that kind of thing. Even Van Druhen, when he arrived and heard it, couldn�t keep the incredulity out of his voice, though all he said was: �Let�s get Mrs. Lampert down here and question her on why she�s so sure this is her son. Then we can get on with finding out why, son or not, she says he killed her husband.�

She was very shook up, as you may imagine, and inclined to be insulted at even being doubted. But finally she said, �All right, gentlemen; I�ll give you incontrovertible proof that this is my son. Gordon had a birthmark on his left thigh, in the rough shape of a heart. Take him somewhere and undress him and find out.�

So we did, and sure enough, there it was.

But our prisoner had an answer for that too. �It was one of the first things Jones told me,� he said, �and he took me down and had me tattooed. This is a tattoo, not a birthmark.�

Sergeant Henderson, who did the search, told me he laughed his head off over that one. He has a tattoo himself, and he was sure anybody could tell the difference. He found out later that they can�t, not always.

When that didn�t go over, the prisoner just about folded up. He muttered something about wishing to heaven he�d been fingerprinted in the past and that would settle the thing once and for all. But that wouldn�t have settled it, since Gordon Lampert had never been fingerprinted either.

We didn�t feel we had enough to hold him for indictment by the Grand Jury on the murder charge, but he�d confessed to impersonation with a view to extortion, so for the time being that would do. I�m simplifying the police process for you, my boy; what you�re interested in is old Josiah Schonfeldt�s reminiscences, not a technical account of police procedure. The judge set a sizable bail � $10,000, as I recall � but of course Mrs. Lampert came across with that right away. She�d accused the man she believed to be her son of murdering his father, but on the premise that he was insane; so the next thing, she had him shipped into a posh private mental hospital and hired the most expensive psychiatrists she could find to prove her point. Naturally we had our own psychiatrists on the job too.

Here � let me find it in the scrapbook. Our men � and they were good, though they didn�t get the fees hers did � agreed that the man booked as Gordon Lampert was �well oriented, completely reasonable, and entirely sane.� They left it a moot question whether he really was Lampert or one Reid Buxton and an impostor, but they were sure he wasn�t a lunatic. As might be expected, Mrs. Lampert�s experts came to exactly the opposite conclusion; he was Gordon Lampert, and he was definitely psychotic.

Am I boring you? You don�t need to be polite. When you�ve reached my age, young fellow, you�ll find you grow more long-winded with every year. So I�ll cut this short.

Whether we believed him or not, we did all the obvious things, of course. Letters addressed to Adam Smith Jones at General Delivery in New York came back uncalled for. There were no records of Lampert�s death in any tb sanitarium in New York State.

The New York police were cooperating all the way, but the Captain decided to send me to New York to see what I could do at first-hand. Every tattoo artist in the city was interviewed, and every one of them said he had never needled a heart on the left thigh of anyone. The bartenders at the cocktail lounge said they couldn�t keep track of the names of all of their customers, but neither of them recalled any two men who looked so much alike or remembered any particular conversation in a back booth.

There was a Reid Buxton. He was on file with practically every theatrical agency and they all had photographs. But they were taken in makeup in various parts he�d played and they were of no use for identification. I was doing this end myself, and at the fifth place I got a shock. �Sure we know him,� said the agent. �He was in here yesterday.�

I�d put off visiting the apartment that our man had given as his address until I�d checked with the agencies. Now I got there quick. It was an old reconstructed brown-stone in the Chelsea district � one of those places where most of the cards in the slots read �Occupied.� I rang the manager�s bell and it turned out to be a manageress. When I asked for Buxton she got defensive.

�If you�re a bill collector,� she said, �leave the poor man alone. He owes me four months rent right now, but I�m not pressing him. He�ll pay up when he gets a part. He�s been here three years, and he�s had his ups and downs, like any actor who isn�t tops, but he always makes good in the end.� Evidently she was one of those stage-struck landladies that hard-up actors on the fringe dream about but seldom encounter.

I assured her I wasn�t after Buxton�s non-existent money, and implied without saying so that I was in the profession and had a prospect for him. Anybody in their right mind would have spotted me for a dick, but not this dame. She said he usually got home around seven, and she gave me his apartment number. So at seven I rang his bell and the door buzzed. I had a New York cop with me to make it legal in case I had to make an arrest.

It was a walkup and we climbed to the fourth floor. He opened the door when I knocked and looked surprised; I guessed he�d been expecting a girl.

�You Reid Buxton?� I asked.

�Yes. What�s it about?�

One glance showed me that nobody could have taken him for anything like Gordon Lampert�s double. His hair and his eyes were dark, as against Lampert�s light brown hair and blue eyes. He was about the same height, but a lot thinner.

�Mind if we come in?� I flashed my badge. He looked puzzled when he found out I was from the Houston police.

He let us in grudgingly and said, �What do you want to see me for?� He didn�t seem alarmed, the way even innocent people usually do with the police, only wary. I took particular note of his voice � an actor�s voice, I thought, well modulated, but on the bass side; our man�s was much higher.

I told him as much as I wanted him to know, if he really was Reid Buxton � that we were holding a man claiming to be him, arrested on a felony charge. Then he really did look both scared and mad.

�The guy�s nuts!� he said.

�Maybe,� I agreed. �That�s one thing being considered. Did you ever know a man named Gordon Lampert?�

He shook his head, then did a double take. �Lampert?� he said. �Isn�t that the name of the rich man who got murdered down in Texas?�

By this time we had given more to the press � not Issachar Lampert�s dying words, or our arrest, but the fact that murder was suspected and the usual malarkey about the police expecting to make an arrest any minute; and since �the missing son of the deceased� was supposed to be in New York, the papers there had given it a paragraph or two more, so it was logical that Buxton could have seen it.

�His son,� I answered him.

�Never met him.�

�What about a man named Adam Smith Jones?�

He laughed. �Never,� he said. �I wouldn�t forget a name like that.�

I showed him two photographs � one of Gordon Lampert at 20 that I�d got from his mother, and another we took. It was hard to tell if they were of two different people. He didn�t recognize either.

I still had the payoff question to ask. �Where were you and what were you doing on November 19th?�

He got really jittery then.

�I was right here in New York City,� he said, �but what I was doing I couldn�t tell you � how can I remember a day like any other? You mean this nut is claiming he�s me, and that I knocked off his old man? I�ve never been in Houston in my life.�

�It�s more complicated than that,� I said. I decided to give him a little more rope. �This man claimed to be Gordon Lampert, back home after fifteen years of exile. The mother accepted him. Then she turned right around and called the police, and told them this was her son all right, but that he had come back before that, on the 19th, quarreled with his father and killed him, and now she wanted him locked up for his own good. Her line is that he�s crazy and will be acquitted because of insanity and sent to a mental hospital. When the guy heard that, he backed down, admitted he was an impostor, that he�d known old Lampert was dead but not that he had been murdered � and that his real name was Reid Buxton, and he gave your address. So we booked him on a fraud and extortion charge, and he�s out now on $10,000 bail.�

Buxton just stared at me with his mouth open.

�I never heard anything so fantastic in all my born days,� he finally managed to say. �Why did he pick on me? I�m nobody important � just a minor character actor out of work. And I�m absolutely certain I don�t know the man at all. Ask the manager, downstairs; she doesn�t see me often but she knows the apartment hasn�t been vacant for even a day.�

Just then there was a noise behind us. The door was still open and in walked the girl he must have had a date with. She was a real dish � probably in the profession too � dressed in a cute print and a little fur jacket, with a rose corsage pinned to the lapel. She stood stockstill, surprised by the scene confronting her. Buxton waved her out, but she wasn�t having any.

�Why, Reid, what�s wrong?� she cried, going up and putting her arms around him.

�Later, Marilyn � go home and I�ll call you,� he muttered, his face red. �Something�s come up.�

And then he started to sneeze.

He couldn�t stop. He kept on sneezing and tears ran down his face. The girl looked contrite.

�Oh, honey, I forgot!� she said. �Here � I�ll throw it out.� And she undid the corsage and threw it into the hall.

�Get out, Marilyn,� he growled between sneezes.

�Oh, very well,� she said, tossing her head, and left.

Son, never let anyone tell you not to follow hunches. What we call a hunch is a sudden clarification of subconscious ideas we may have had all along. I got one then, and I obeyed it instantly.

�Well, Mr. Buxton,� I said, �this sure is a mix-up. Sorry to have spoiled your date. We�ll be talking to you again when we�ve got it all straightened out.�

�Any time,� he said, still sneezing. �Always glad to help the police. And don�t worry about the girl; I only met her last week.�

I hustled the New York cop out with me, and the minute we got back to headquarters I had them put a tail on Reid Buxton. Then I phoned Henderson in Houston and told him to find out � not from Mrs. Lampert, but from Dr. Harris, the same doctor they�d had for years and the one who was called in after the murder � if Gordon Lampert had ever had an allergy to roses.

You see, I was remembering that the big room in the Lampert house had been full of vases of hothouse roses. And nary a sneeze had ever come out of our suspect.

Henderson called back in an hour, and said yes.

That was the beginning of the end. We picked up the so-called Buxton on a charge of impersonation, and there on his left thigh was the birthmark � a lot more naturallooking than the one tattooed on the real Buxton. The phony Buxton broke down pretty fast after that, and led us to the tattoo artist he�d paid to keep his mouth shut. We got him extradited to Texas, and he was indicted for murder. They found him guilty and sane, and he got life; he�s still in Huntsville.

He was, of course, Gordon Lampert, alias Adam Smith Jones. Every word the real Reid Buxton had told us was true.

The phony Buxton�s dark hair was a wig, the dark eyes were tinted contact lenses, and he�d been dieting like mad to lose weight. He�d deliberately lowered the tone of his voice. The landlady had phoned up to him I was coming, and he was ready for me. Apparently he hadn�t had a chance to warn off Marilyn.

What�s more, when that canary sang, he sang plenty. He said the whole scheme was really his mother�s. She had known from the beginning where he was � they�d always been in communication, and she�d kept him well heeled; he�d never had to work. She kept after old Issachar till she thought she had him softened, and then she�d told Gordon to come home. She was there when he came on November 19th; she was there when he quarreled again with his father, knocked him down, and pounded his head on the corner of the steel desk in the study till his skull was crushed.

She hid him somewhere in that mansion while they worked things out. She persuaded him to go back to New York and try to find a man who could pretend to be him; she�d made out as if she believed it and then turn the impostor in for the murder. It would be a perfect frame-up. She�d go through all the motions � Van Druhen for the defense, the plea of insanity, and the high-priced psychiatrists, and she would go on the stand if necessary and perjure herself about his mental history.

She was certain � and she was probably right � that if the fall guy escaped the chair or a life sentence he would be confined in a maximum-security mental hospital and never be released.

Then she and her son would go away together somewheres out of the country � don�t ask me about passports, but there are plenty of ways to wangle it when you�ve got millions � and live abroad under another name. She�d sell all her property and transfer her money and stocks to an anonymous account in a Swiss bank � you know, an account identified only by a number. And they�d live happily ever after.

She might very well have got away with it, if only Gordon had remembered to warn Buxton to sneeze whenever he got near any roses.

Millions of dollars or not, we�d have had her indicted for conspiracy and as accessory, if she hadn�t taken an overdose of sleeping pills.

Buxton � the real Buxton � got five years. He served it, with time off for good behavior, and disappeared. He changed his name, and as I said, he keeps in touch with me, but I�m not giving him away. You�ve probably seen him on TV � he plays mostly old men�s parts now.

Well, that�s it, my boy � my most exciting case. Long ago and forgotten by now. But here � look in the scrapbook. Oh, I showed you that clipping, didn�t I? They gave me a citation, and that�s when I told them, �I only did my duty.� I never was one to boast.

Hey, tell that dog of yours to go back in the garden. I get hives if I let any dog get near me. That�s how I came to know so much about allergies.

When EQMM published Joan Richter�s first two stories in 1962, the Richter family lived in Valhalla, New York. But the Richters have traveled since then. Mr. Richter became Deputy Director of the Peace Corps project in Kenya, and Mrs. Richter writes that each day in and around Nairobi unfolds some new surprise for her; much of the East African countryside, she says, is like New England and Northern California combined, with the added attractions of thatched huts and roaming wild game. And Mrs. Richter�s letterhead bears out the latter: the pale blue sheet of paper has a left-hand border in brown and black showing two giraffes, an elephant, a rhinoceros, a water buffalo, a lion, and other fauna of the Richters� new home.

But we are happy to report that Joan Richter has not limited her writing to letters. Here is her first story about East Africa, and it has a perceptive quality � the freshness of perceptive eyes seeing new sights, wondrous and exotic sights, for the first time...

She waited until the churning of the Land Rover�s heavy wheels on the long gravel drive had faded into the softer sound of tires against murum and then she got up and quickly began to dress. She was annoyed that she had wasted the last hour in a pretense of sleep, but it had been preferable to a confrontation with Jack.

She had heard him get up while it was still dark and go outside. And she had imagined him as he crouched on the rise overlooking the field of maize, waiting, as he had been waiting and watching every dawn for the last two weeks. Sometimes she wondered if he remembered any longer what it was he was waiting for.

She threw a sweater over her suntanned shoulders and left the house by the veranda door, passing the kitchen as she went to tell Kariuki all she wanted this morning was coffee and she would fix that herself later. She walked across the dew-soaked lawn, past the bottle brush tree from whose rose-colored flowers the sunlight birds drank their morning fill, to where the shrubs thinned and she could look out across the green valley to the opposite ridge.

Overhead the East African sky was an intense blue, spreading endlessly, with high clouds that rose like white mountains asking to be climbed. Sometimes she wondered if Jack saw any of this, if he realized at all how much beauty there was just outside their window.

She breathed deeply of the cool air. It was dry, but it did not strike her as thin, not even on that first day, a year ago, when they had just arrived. The only time she felt the altitude was when she walked uphill, and then her breath came in quick, short pulls and her chest felt hard and tight.

A cracking of a twig caused her to look down the near slope into the valley where, among the trees and brush, the smoke of cook fires rose. She saw a man making his way up along one of the paths, his dark head bent, so that she could not see his face; but from his dress � the short-sleeved white shirt and the dark trousers � she was sure it was Molo, one of the few farmers in the area who had adopted European dress.

He had a small shamba on the other side of the valley where in previous years he had raised potatoes and maize, but this season he had set out his first real money crop � a half acre of pyrethrum, a silver green plant from whose daisy-like flowers an insecticide was extracted. She wondered what the occasion was for his leaving his shamba so early in the day.

�Habari,� she said, using the Swahili greeting.

�Mzuri,� he replied, but the look on his face did not seem to agree that everything was good.

There were a few more prescribed words for them to exchange before they exhausted her knowledge of Swahili. Then they would switch to English and slowly Molo would come to the point of his visit.

He looked up at the sky. �The rains come soon.�

She looked too, but saw nothing that resembled a rain cloud. But, then, both night and day the skies were strange to her. The stars were not the ones she knew, nor were the clouds. She knew only that they were beautiful, more so than any she had ever seen anywhere.

�Is the Bwana at home?�

He called her Memsab Simon, but he never called Jack anything but Bwana.

�He left early this morning on safari.� She smiled, still not used to the East African meaning of the word; only rarely did it mean sun helmets and bearers and trekking through the bush; most often it referred to any trip out of town, whether for a day or a week.

�Did the Bwana Red go with him?�

Lately Jack almost never went anywhere without Red, and she did not know whether that made her angry or relieved, whether it was an indication of Jack�s lack of trust in her, or lack of confidence in himself. She liked Red � perhaps too much � but she had done nothing to cause Jack to be jealous. Whether Red returned her admiration she had no idea, for he showed no sign; but her ego was mollified by the knowledge that Red was no fool. He had to work with Jack (another sticky point � Jack was the boss, but Red, having lived in East Africa for the last ten years, knew all there was to know).

�Yes, Bwana Red went with him. Is something wrong, Molo? Do you need more seed?�

Jack had come to East Africa on a two-year contract as an agricultural adviser, and one of the things for which he was responsible was the parceling out of seed. It was given on a loan basis, to be paid for when the crop was harvested. It was a precious commodity, doled out on the basis of past records of repayment. Jack had been concerned about stealing, so he kept the sacks of seed locked in a storehouse at one end of the maize field.

That was the one thing she didn�t like, the one thing that marred the beauty of the land and the sky; barred windows, locked doors � not just outside doors, but all inside doors, to closets and pantries, doors that sealed one section of a house off from another.

�It�s different with the seed,� she had said to Jack, though she had not really meant it � but the seed was not her affair. �But I�ll be darned if I�m going to lock up the pantry every time I leave the house, just so the houseboy won�t help himself to a spoonful of sugar!�

She had pointed to a peg board on the wall. �Look at that! There must be fifty different keys there. I won�t live that way.�

�The house is yours to run as you want,� Jack had said. �But don�t come crying to me the day one of them��and he had nodded in the direction where Kariuki and his helper were preparing lunch � �walks off with something that can�t be replaced.�

After that she had put the silver that Jack�s family had given them in the wall safe behind the mirror in the bedroom and left it there. It was too much bother taking it out in the morning and locking it up again at night.

One day when Red was with them, Jack brought up the topic again, thinking he would have his colleague�s support; but Red had said, �If I bothered to check, I suppose at the end of each month I�d find I was out a pound of sugar and maybe some tea. On a day to day basis Jinja helps himself to a banana or toast that�s left over from breakfast. The banana would rot before I�d get around to eating it � and what would I do with leftover toast but throw it away?�

�That isn�t the point,� Jack had countered. �They ought to be taught that what�s yours is not theirs.�

�There�s a difference between stealing money and things of value � and taking scraps of food.� Red�s voice had been patient, but not condescending. �When Jinja washes my trousers, he checks the pockets because I�m ways leaving things in them � cigarettes, screws, keys, a few shillings. He keeps a basket on the shelf above the tub for all that stuff. I find the shillings there too, along with everything else.�

Jack had looked at him narrowly. �Have you ever checked? Have you ever left an odd bunch of change��

�You mean have I ever tried to trap him?�

Jack nodded.

Red shook his head. �If I did that it would mean I didn�t trust him. And he would know, and then the whole thing would break down and I couldn�t trust him.�

Jack had continued the discussion, long after Red would have been happy to let it go. In a final effort to win a point Jack had flashed, �The Africans wanted freedom, now they have to accept the responsibility that goes with it!�

�I couldn�t agree with you more,� Red had said, �But I don�t go along with your methods. You want to police them � and that isn�t freedom. Sure there are thieves among them � but show me a society that hasn�t any. Just once suspect them of thievery without cause, and you will create a thief.�

After Red had left them, she had not been able to keep silent. Perhaps she had been too strong in stating her position, for Jack had said unpleasantly, �So you think the Bwana Red is a great hero too.� And Jack had turned away...

Now Molo shook his head, No, he had not come for seed.

What does he want, she wondered. What has brought him up from the valley at a time of day when he should be working his shamba? Although she was better at it than when they had first come, she still found it difficult to read the African face. Joy she could identify, but other emotions � anger, fear, distrust � eluded her.

She prepared herself for more small talk. �The tomato plants you gave me are doing very well, Molo. Would you like to see them?�

A sudden though almost imperceptible change in his expression made her realize that accidentally she had hit on what he had been waiting for. He had been waiting for her to invite him onto her land.

�I would like to see maize. Bwana says wild pig is coming and eating.�

So even Molo had heard of Jack�s morning excursions. �You can have my gun,� Red had offered. �I bet, whatever it is, comes around dawn. From that rise over there it would be an easy shot.�

�I�ll get him,� Jack had said, �but I won�t use a gun.�

�Suit yourself, but setting traps can be slow. That�s a big field.�

�Traps?� She remembered the arrogance in Jack�s voice. �I intend to use a bow.�

Red had looked up quickly and perhaps the look that crossed his face had been one of admiration, though she had not seen it as such. But Jack�s satisfied face had been evidence enough of his own interpretation.

�I�m a fair marksman,� he had said. �I had some practice in the States.�

Silently she recalled the country club�s manicured lawn, the steady bull�s-eye target.

�A couple of weeks ago I bought a bow from one of Molo�s brothers and a dozen arrows. It�s a different kind of weapon from what I�ve been used to, but it sure has zing.�

�A little light to do in a pig,� Red said, �unless you�re an incredibly good shot.�

Jack had given him a smug look. �I�ve got something else that will help it along.�

She remembered the frown that had creased Red�s brow. �I�d be careful with that stuff. It�s not something to fool with.�

�Thanks for the advice. I never did have a wet nurse, and I hardly need one now.�

Just the recollection of his retort made her blush...

Molo led the way along the ridge toward the maize. She knew that the polite palaver was over. They were getting to the reason for his visit. He turned when they reached the edge of the green field and continued along the north side of the planted area, moving in the direction of the rise, the lookout Jack went to every morning, where she knew he had gone this morning before he�d left to meet Red.

At the rise Molo stopped, and for the first time she noticed that he had his panga with him, the machete-like knife whose broad blade was used to cut grass, chop roots, dig potatoes, prune trees, and sever the heads off chickens. It was as much a part of the African farm scene as was the hoe in the States before mechanization. Usually when Molo came to pay a social call or to see Jack or Red on business, he left his panga behind. Idly, she wondered why he had it with him now.

He was pointing with it and she followed the dark line of his arm to the end of the blade.

�Pig come out of forest and walk low on belly through maize.�

For a moment she could not see the slight furrow in the sea of green stalks, but then her eyes discovered the thin line that traveled straight across the otherwise untouched field.

�You stay here, Memsab Simon.�

There was something in the tone of his voice that she reacted to. He was not being rude, but rather protective, and she wondered against what. Or was she misunderstanding completely? Was this like an expression she could not read?

�Molo, you don�t think the pig is there now?�

�No, pig is gone.�

�Then why, what��

�It is better you stay. Let me see.�

She nodded. Molo might be a guest on her land, but she was still a stranger in his country. With an uneasiness � of what she was not sure � she stood watching him as he descended the small hill and entered the maize. Overhead the sky was the same blue it had been minutes ago, before she had seen him coming up from the valley, with the same white, climbing clouds. There was still no visible sign of rain. It was something else that had thrown a shadow over the day.

The maize was shoulder high, so that when Molo paused and looked at the ground she could not see what it was he was looking at.

What had he found? What was he looking for?

He straightened and walked forward, stopping again after a few paces. Then he walked quickly on as though he had seen ahead of him what he had been looking for.

He had entered the field from the side bounded by the forest and was following the path that had been broken for him. As she studied the larger picture she saw that the parting in the maize seemed to lead to the storehouse.

Oh, God, she thought. Some animal found a way into Jack�s burglarproof store! Had Jack come here every morning for the last two weeks and not discovered this for himself?

Molo had almost reached the wooden building. As she watched his movements a thought began to form in her mind. Had an animal made that path? Or had it been a man? A man trying to find a way to break into the seed store?

Molo had said something earlier that now made her wonder. �Pig come out of forest and walk low on belly through maize.� It was an odd way to describe an animal�s foraging.

Molo had reached the storehouse and was standing with his eyes cast down. Then he raised his head and called in Swahili. �Come now.�

Hurriedly she started down the slope, slipping as she went, but driven by an impatience that came of waiting, curiosity, and a mounting concern that something was wrong. Her sweater slipped off her shoulders, but she did not stop to pick it up. At the edge of the maize field she put her arms up in front of her face to shield it from the slashing leaves.

She stumbled and looked down at the ground and saw what Molo had seen � a stone smeared with blood and more blood on one of the low leaves. Ahead there were drops of blood, hardly visible on the red brown earth, but unmistakable and vivid against the pale green of the maize.

Had Jack hit his target this morning? Had he only wounded it? She looked around her, trying to see into the impenetrable maize. The wounded animal might be hidden, crouching, waiting to spring at her, or to charge. How could Molo be so sure it was gone? Already she had thrust the thought from her that her husband�s quarry might have been human.

Her breath was coming in quick shallow gasps when she reached Molo who was standing in the shadow of the storehouse. Her eyes fell to the ground and she saw a pile of dirt and a hole dug under the foundation; beside them a sack of seed and an abandoned panga that had been used to dig the hole.

She took all this in, and more, for at Molo�s feet lay an arrow, its shaft bloody, its sharp triangular point sticky. Her hands flew to her face and she heard herself moan. An animal could not use a panga, nor could it tear an arrow from its stricken body! The succeeding thought made her cringe and her head twisted between her hands. Jack had shot a man!

All arrows looked the same. Perhaps it wasn�t Jack�s at all. He had marked his, scoring the shaft. But from where she stood she could not see � the shaft was partially covered with the loosened earth.

With a supreme effort she slid her hands down from her face and brought them to her sides. She had to find out. She had to know. She hesitated, and then with horrified determination she took a quick step forward, her hand outstretched. But almost before she moved, Molo�s shadow was upon her and his arm caught her across the chest and threw her to the ground.

A scream choked in her throat as she stared up at him, a black man standing over her, his panga raised. It sliced through the air and caught the blood-smeared arrow and tossed it aside.

She saw him stab his panga in the ground and turn to her. �I am sorry, Memsab, but the arrow is poison.�

He held out his hand and helped her to her feet.

�Even a scratch brings death.�

A residue of terror filled her throat and she did not trust herself to speak, for she could not let Molo know what she had thought. She looked at him and pointed to where the arrow lay. The question formed slowly on her lips. �Is it the Bwana�s arrow?�

�Yes,� he said. �It killed my brother.�

Her hand reached out and then fell to her side. What was there for her to say?

�I am sorry, too,� Molo said and then she knew that her face did not present the enigma to him that his did to her. �I am sorry that my brother became a thief � and that your husband must die.�

Oh, God, she thought, what did that mean? Tribal vengeance? Could she reason with Molo? If not, she would have to get word to Jack somehow. It was possible that he and Red had not yet left town.

She turned to Molo, hoping she could find some words to reach him, but he had already begun to speak. The words came slowly, thoughtfully, half in English, half in Swahili.

�Before the Bwana came, my brother was watchman for the Bwana Red. He slept at night outside the seed store, the old one which we do not use any more. No one stole or they would know my brother�s panga.�

Molo�s eyes fell to the ground where the multipurpose knife lay. Then he looked at her again. �But then the new Bwana came and everything changed and my brother became a thief.� He stopped. It was as much as he could say.

�But why did your brother sell my husband a bow? Why did he give him the poison?�

�The bow he sold because he needed money, and because he thought the Bwana could not shoot well. But he did not give him poison. He would not. The Bwana got poison somewhere far from here, from someone he pay a lot of money.�

Suddenly Molo cocked his head, in response to some distant sound. She heard it too. It was the Land Rover returning. She heard it leave the murum road and turn into the gravel drive.

�It is the Bwana Red,� Molo said.

She looked, but it was too far for her to recognize who was in the vehicle. It bore down on them coming as close to the field as it could. Then she saw that it was Red driving and that the seat beside him was empty.

She ran toward him. �Where�s Jack?�

�In town. What�s going on? He sent me out here, said there was something for me to see.�

�There was no wild pig in the maize � it was Molo�s brother. He�d dug a hole under the storehouse.�

Red frowned as he climbed out of the Land Rover. �I guess that�s one for Jack�s side. I�d have said it would take a lot to make Molo�s brother turn thief.� A flicker of hope crossed his clouded face. �I suppose Jack caught him in the act?�

She took a breath. �Jack didn�t catch him. He killed him.�

Red�s face went blank with disbelief. �Why? He was a man, not an animal. Why did he kill him?�

Tears seared her eyes, but she fought against them. It was past the time for weeping. She had no answer to Red�s question. It was what she had been asking herself.

Molo had come up and was standing with them. Red turned to him. �How did he do it? He wasn�t that good a shot with the bow.�

�The arrow came here.� Molo touched the fleshy part of his thigh. �It would not have killed him � but it was poisoned.�

�Poisoned!� Red turned to her. �Where did he get poison?�

�I thought he�d gotten it from Molo�s brother. But Molo says no, that he got it somewhere far from here.�

�That arrogant � this can only mean trouble for all of us � whites and blacks.�

Molo shook his head. �No, Bwana Red. There will be no trouble. My brother is dead. And the Bwana will die. It will end there.�

�Molo, old friend,� Red said in Swahili, �the viper eventually spends itself. Do not put yourself in danger by seeking its death.�

�Do not worry, Bwana Red. The viper has felt its own sting.�

She looked from one man to the other. What had they said? She had caught the proverb, but did not understand its application. She turned to Red. �Why didn�t Jack come back with you? Where is he?�

�I left him at the dispensary. He cut himself on one of those damn arrowheads � not bad, but enough to need a couple of stitches. I wanted to wait with him, but he didn�t seem to want me around. Now I understand why.�

She listened to each word, each progressive syllable, and her realization grew until the horror of it was evident in her face.

Red caught her hand. �God, I�m sorry. I know what you�re thinking. But he�s all right. It�s just a simple cut. You see the poison is applied to the shaft of the arrow, not the tip � for reasons just like this � it�s so easy to get a scratch and that�s all you need.�

She looked at him and shook her head. Then she turned to Molo. �How did you know? How did you know the Bwana would die?�

�Many people were in town, waiting at the dispensary. They brought the news to my shamba.�

�What�s this all about?� Red said, turning to her. �I just told you. He�ll be all right.�

�No,� she said. �No, he won�t. You see he didn�t know about applying the poison to the shaft � he put it on the arrowheads.�

Lieutenant Roberts considered Lockston a serious security risk...

The new security officer sat in the Director�s office holding a thin file and trying to suppress his impatience. He was a young man, although not as young as he looked, being twenty-six. He was also ambitious and untroubled by a sense of humor.

To the Director, gazing at him from behind his desk, his youth was frightening. The previous security officer, Captain Grayson, had been middle-aged � an easy-going man with a mind you could get in touch with and an unobtrusive efficiency. His successor, Lieutenant Roberts, paraded efficiency like a banner.

But the Director showed no sign of these feelings as he listened to what Lieutenant Roberts was saying.

�Lockston will have to go, sir. In view of what I�ve just told you it�ll be impossible to continue to give him security clearance. In fact, he should never have been allowed to work on the project in the first place.�

The Director leaned back in his chair, puffed comfortably at his pipe, and regarded the security officer through the smoke. He couldn�t claim that Lockston was a key man, but he was part of the team and he didn�t want to lose him. Besides, Lockston was someone he liked.

He said, �You haven�t told me anything to make me think that Lockston might be disloyal.�

�He was a member of a subversive organization, sir.�

�But that was twenty-five years ago � when he was at the University.�

�It indicates his political leanings at that time, and if he has changed his mind since then, why didn�t he inform my predecessor who carried out the original screening?�

�Perhaps he forgot.�

�Forgot!�

The Director smiled. �It�s quite possible, you know. You give five bob to some society. For the Betterment of Cultural Relations, or something like that. You don�t know that it�s really subversive and if you do you don�t care because � well, you�re nineteen and it amuses you. Good heavens, I probably joined such things myself.�

�I hope you didn�t, sir. In any case, the other matter is more important. Lockston has been in prison. You don�t suggest that he might have forgotten that?�

�Of course not. But it was a long time ago, too. Besides, his crime had no bearing on security.�

�Everything has a bearing on security, sir. Especially a thing like this. It�s a character weakness.�

�A character weakness? Lockston?� The Director shook his head. �May I see the file?�

Reluctantly Lieutenant Roberts passed it across the desk and the Director examined it thoughtfully. Here were revealed isolated details of Lockston�s life, but the typewritten or printed words had no meaning for the Director. They made no impact on a mind that had already formed its opinion.

�Odd that your predecessor didn�t dig this up.�

The security officer said nothing: he considered that his predecessor had been incredibly careless. He let the thought ride the silence until the Director looked up at him sharply. Then Roberts said, �You understand, sir, that if an enemy agent were to get hold of a thing like this he might use it as a lever.�

�That hadn�t escaped me. But I can�t see Lockston letting himself be blackmailed.�

�The man�s unstable, sir. It�s not a risk I�m prepared to take.�

�The responsibility would be mine, wouldn�t it?�

�I think not, sir.�

The Director tapped out his pipe. Arguing would do no good; Lieutenant Roberts had made up his mind and this was a matter on which the authorities would support him.

The Director said, �What do you want me to do?�

�He must be dismissed.�

�I�ve no reason.�

�You�ll have to think of one.�

�Very well. Do you mind if I keep this file for a day or two? Men with Lockston�s qualifications are not so easy to find. I shall need a little time.�

�How much time, sir?�

�I can�t say. Two weeks, perhaps.�

The security officer stood up. �Don�t let it be longer, sir.�

When he had gone the Director refilled his pipe. It had been no surprise to him to learn that Lockston was, or had been, a rogue, but this did not affect his liking for the man. And in spite of what Roberts had called a character weakness, he doubted if Lockston could be broken, even by blackmail, into doing something he had no mind for.

He doubted � but he couldn�t be sure.

During the days that ensued, Lieutenant Roberts tried hard to keep an eye on Lockston; but he had no reason to follow him everywhere and he certainly didn�t follow him on a Saturday afternoon ten days later when Lockston paid a visit to the neighboring town.

Lockston was a tall craggy man in his middle forties. He had few friends, perhaps because he didn�t need them. On his occasional visits to town it was his habit to go to the cinema, and afterward he usually had a light meal at a nearby coffee house.

It was so on that afternoon. Lockston obtained coffee and a plate of bacon and eggs at the counter and then carried them over to one of the tables.

A few moments later another man entered the cafe. He too ordered coffee which he carried to the same table at which Lockston sat. Lockston looked up at him in surprise, for the place was not full and many of the other tables were empty.

The stranger said, �You mind if I sit here?�

�It�s all right if you want to.�

The stranger made a slight inclination of his body, the movement hinting at a formal bow. �You English wish for privacy. I would not have intruded only... you�re Mr. Lockston, aren�t you?�

�Yes. How did you know?�

�I�ve seen you before. Or was it your photograph? You work at that hush-hush place � some sort of semi-military establishment out of town?�

Lockston had been trying to read the evening newspaper. He now put it down. �Who are you?�

�My name,� the man smiled, �is Masters.�

�What do you want, Mr. Masters?�

�To do you a service.�

He took a wallet from his pocket and extracted a newspaper clipping which he placed on the table. Lockston stared at it. He did not need to read it because he knew well what was printed there. After a while he looked up. His face expressed nothing, neither fear nor anger, and his eyes were steady.

He said, �What do you want?�

Masters gave a little shrug. �Twelve months,� he said. �Do you still feel bitter about it, Mr. Lockston?�

�I never did feel bitter.�

�But you should. It was a savage sentence. What harm had you done? The women spoke up for you, didn�t they? By the way, what happened to them?�

�It was eighteen years ago.�

�As long as that? But these things are not forgotten, are they? Not in a bourgeois society. You were sent to prison, but did the punishment end there? No. And what happened afterwards? To your career? Didn�t you find it difficult to get a job? And even now, I doubt if those who employ you are aware of the contents of that clipping.�

�Now we�re getting somewhere,� said Lockston. �Are you proposing to send it to them?�

�Certainly not.�

�What is it you want then? Money?�

�Good heavens, my dear chap, no. I�m on your side. I sympathize with you. Anyone who has the courage to defy the bourgeois code. I�d like to make it up to you for what you�ve suffered.�

�You would? How?�

�I shall think of a way.�

�If you have a proposition to make, go ahead.�

Masters picked up the clipping and replaced it in his pocket.

�A proposition? I must think of something.� He stood up. �To our next meeting, Mr. Lockston.�

�When will that be?�

�Soon. Don�t worry, Mr. Lockston. I�ll get in touch with you.�

Lockston watched him go, sitting there for a full half minute, motionless. Then, with a movement of his shoulders that seemed to shake off his thoughts, he calmly continued with his meal...

Bankhart of the Homicide Squad was hobnobbing with �the four hundred�; he was also making a play for a gorgeous blue-eyed babe hanging on every thrilling word that Bank was improvising about a homicide that had never happened � and then it did happen! Not the murder case Bank was inventing � but a stunner just the same...

One of the most interesting investigations in Lawrence Treat�s new police procedural series � Mr. Treat has the true �tec touch...

What with the blare of the orchestra out on the lawn, nobody even heard the shot, least of all big Jim Bankhart of the Homicide Squad. He was one of two hundred or so guests dining under the caterer�s tent on that rainy, summer evening. As far as Bank was concerned, somebody could have fired off a cannon and he wouldn�t have noticed it. He had other things on his mind.

He was wearing a formal white jacket, and he had his table partner spellbound. Her clear blue eyes gazed up with adoration at his busted nose and his tomahawk of a face. She was sitting next to a real live detective, and she was thrilled. She kept saying so.

She was definitely his dish. He had a romantic streak in him and he always dreamed of meeting beautiful blondes. Or brunettes or redheads or any other color they happened to dye their hair. The Homicide Squad usually kidded the pants off him, but if they could see him now, all dolled up and with this blue-eyed babe hanging on every word of his, they�d fall over backwards.

Occasionally he stopped thrilling her and scanned the faces of the bankers and brokers and yachtsmen and their bejeweled wives jabbering away at the other tables. It struck him that any first-class crook could have made a nice haul. The way the champagne was flowing, you could just pass the hat and they�d probably fill it up with diamonds, and not even care.

Still, that wasn�t Bank�s responsibility. He was here in high society because his friend, Vinny de Solo, was going to marry Vicky Hoskins. Vinny and Vicky � it even sounded like a love match, and the occasion called for a celebration. Bank, waiting for the next dance, figured out that the shindig probably set Peter Hoskins back around ten grand. Which didn�t bother Bank a bit. He was concentrating on romance.

Her name was Carol something-or-other. He hadn�t caught the rest of it or maybe she hadn�t told him, but in due time he�d find out. Meanwhile his soft, almost gentle voice gave no indication it could drown out a foghorn, and he had her practically mesmerized. He was telling her the story of a homicide that he was making up as he went along. He broke off when he heard an apologetic cough and became aware of the shadow of a man leaning forward, just behind his shoulder.

Bank swung around. The long humble face and the ingratiating manner belonged to no guest. �Butler� was written all over him.

�I beg your pardon.� he said. �Mr. Bankhart?�

�Yeah?� Bank said, telling himself there was only one reason for the interruption. There�d been a homicide somewhere, and Lieutenant Decker wanted him. Goodbye, romance.

�Could you come inside a moment?� the butler said. �Mr. Hoskins would like to see you.�

The blue-eyed angel piped up in surprise. �Jasper, what on earth can Daddy want?�

�I�m afraid I couldn�t say, Miss Carol.�

Which told Bank a lot. Carol was Hoskins� younger daughter, and Bank was flying high. He put a big meaty paw on her bare arm and held it there long enough to watch the effect, which was promising.

�Be back,� he said, letting his fingers slide down a couple of inches. �Wait for me.�

�Forever,� she breathed.

He realized she was kidding him, but he took it in stride. He pursed his lips in the form of a kiss, gave her a broad grin, and stood up. He threaded his way between the tables and headed for the canvas corridor that connected the tent with the main house. It had been raining earlier, but he heard no sound on the canvas top, so he assumed that the storm had passed.

Inside the house, in the wide paneled hallway, Jasper halted. The two living rooms and the spacious dining room were empty now. Only the litter of cocktail glasses and cigarette butts remained as evidence of the crowd that had been here a half hour ago.

�If you�ll go upstairs,� Jasper said, �Mr. Hoskins is waiting for you.�

Bank nodded and headed up. The bedrooms � and there might be a dozen of them � were probably on the floor above. It crossed his mind that the jewel theft he�d thought about a few minutes ago might have been pulled off. Why else send for him?

Peter Hoskins, a somber, nervous, middle-aged banker of medium height, was waiting on the landing. His hands were rammed in his jacket pockets, and his attitude was grim.

�Mr. Bankhart,� he said, �would you come into my wife�s bedroom? There�s been a tragedy, a�� he hesitated, licked his lips � �a murder, and you�d better take charge.�

�Are you kidding?� Bank said.

�Hardly. And I hope you can handle this without spoiling the party. Vicky�s engagement � this is a terrible thing to happen now.�

�Let�s go see,� Bank said curtly.

Hoskins led him down the hall and opened a door at the far end, and Bank entered. He saw a large room lavishly furnished with a ritzy bed, a chaise lounge, a few comfortable chairs, a table, a color TV set, and a couple of bureaus. A jade lamp and one of the chairs had been knocked over, a bureau drawer and a wall safe were wide open, and a man lay sprawled on the floor. A cocktail glass was upended, just beyond his reach.

Bank walked over and stared down. The man was lying on his stomach, and his head was turned so that you could see one of his fixed, sightless eyes. A few drops of blood were barely visible on the light tan carpet, and the small rent in the back of his jacket might have been the exit hole of a bullet. The man was obviously dead.

Bank spun around. �Know him?� he asked Hoskins.

�Ronald Early,� Hoskins said. His tone was clipped, as if he were repressing a deep emotion, and doing it only with great effort. �An associate. One of my oldest friends.�

�Think he might have been committing larceny?�

�Impossible. I tell you, he was a close friend of mine. He had no financial troubles � I�m sure of it.�

�He might have surprised a burglar, struggled with him, and got killed. What was in the safe?�

�A substantial amount of jewelry. Besides that, I usually keep a few thousand in cash.�

�And the combination? Who knows it?�

�My wife had it written down on a piece of paper that she kept in her bureau drawer. She had a bad memory and��

�See if the thing�s still there.�

Peter Hoskins bent down and rummaged in the drawer. After a few moments he straightened up. �No,� he said. �It�s gone.�

�I�ll notify the Homicide Squad,� Bank said. He lapsed into the stiff, formal language of police reports, which over the years he had somehow or other come to adopt whenever he was working with the public. �Meanwhile would you instruct your staff not to move any of the vehicles in which your guests arrived, and to permit no one to leave the premises?�

Hoskins nodded. �You�ll handle this as quietly as possible, won�t you?�

�This is a homicide,� Bank said. �Kindly carry out my instructions, and then return.�

Hoskins left. Bank slapped his palm with a clenched fist, frowned, walked over to the phone. He examined it from varying angles of light and then, holding it gingerly in his handkerchief, picked it up. After speaking to the despatcher at headquarters, Bank called Lieutenant Decker and gave him a short summary of what had happened.

With that done, Bank stood in the center of the room and gazed around intently, covering it section by section. When he reached the area near the south window he spotted the bit of metal. He strode over to it, bent down and picked up a spent bullet. It was in fair condition and probably a .38. The place where he�d found it meant that Early had been standing with his back to the window when he�d been shot. The bullet must have gone clear through him, hit the wall, and then dropped.

Bank studied the flowered wallpaper, scanning the pattern row by row until he found the small slash where the bullet had hit. It had apparently bounced back and fallen on the carpet.

Bank, satisfied that he�d doped out the basic physical facts of the murder, saw that the investigation was going to be complicated. The guests had been milling around downstairs and there had been a steady stream of traffic to this floor, where people had checked their belongings at the opposite end of the hall. What with the rain, everybody had been wearing some kind of coat and had made at least one trip upstairs � including himself.

The initial questions then were why Early had come into Mrs. Hoskins� bedroom in the first place, and how come Hoskins had found the body, when he should have been out in the tent, being a host.

When Hoskins returned, Bank led with his first question. He did it obliquely, so as not to show what he was really after.

�Under what circumstances did you discover the body?� he asked.

�I didn�t. One of the maids came in to tidy up. She saw the body and screamed, and then she went for Jasper. He notified me, and I sent for you at once.�

�Get Jasper,� Bank said. �And the maid.�

Hoskins glowered as if he wasn�t used to being ordered around, but he made no protest. As he started to leave, Bank remarked offhanedly, �Do you own a gun?�

Hoskins swung around in surprise. �Me?� he asked. �Me?�

�That�s what I asked.�

Hoskins shook his head slowly. �No,� he said. �And if I had one, I�d certainly keep it locked up.�

�All right,� Bank said. �Go ahead.�

While Hoskins was gone, Bank spoke to the coatroom attendants, a couple of elderly women who were bragging about their grandchildren when Bank interrupted. The two women had been inside the improvised cloakroom all evening and had not seen or heard anything. Pretty much the same went for Jasper and the maid, who appeared a few minutes later.

Full stop.

Bank was alone in the bedroom when Lieutenant Decker, Chief of Homicide, and Jub Freeman, laboratory technician, arrived. A few minutes later Inspectors Taylor and Balenky and Small showed up, and then the Medical Examiner and the rest of the Homicide Squad, plus a couple of policewomen to help check out the female guests.

Lieutenant Decker, tall and gray and efficient, examined the body and the room, and reached the same tentative conclusions that Bank had.

�Bank,� the Lieutenant said, �you�ve been hobnobbing with their majesties. What�s your angle?�

�Hard to say,� Bank answered. �Whoever opened the safe must have known the layout and where the combination was kept, but I don�t see how that helps much. It could have been somebody in the household or even one of the invited guests. On the other hand, one of the servants could have learned where the combination was kept and either taken the jewelry himself or else tipped off an accomplice. The accomplice could have lost himself in the crowd nothing to it. This was a crook�s paradise.�

�What were the arrangements for getting in here?� Decker asked �Have to show your invitation?�

�No. Hoskins owns about thirty acres. With the entrance to his estate almost a quarter of a mile from the house, you drove through the gates and a parking attendant took your car and gave you a ticket for it. There were station wagons waiting to take you from there up to the house, and you just walked in. Nothing formal, no receiving line or any of that jazz. I didn�t see Vinny when I arrived, so I introduced myself to Hoskins and then somebody handed me a drink.�

�Brother!� Decker exclaimed. �The catering staff, the orchestra, the parking attendants, and all the other flunkeys, besides a couple of hundred guests, and any one of them may be loping around with a pocketful of jewelry and a gun � if he hasn�t stashed the stuff somewhere.�

�It�s worse than that,� Bank said grimly. �Anybody wearing the right clothes and tipped off about the safe could have walked into the house, introduced himself to Vinny, and said he was a friend of Hoskins, or introduced himself to Hoskins and said he was a friend of Vinny�s, and then gone upstairs and simply turned to the right instead of the left. That is, come in here instead of going to the cloakroom.�

�The uninvited guest,� Decker said, grimacing. �You think Early got shot for interrupting him? Could be. The uninvited guest could walk upstairs carrying a coat � that would look normal; but if he came downstairs carrying it or wearing it and headed for the door, that wouldn�t look normal. He�d probably be noticed.�

�So he�d have to forget about his coat,� Bank said. �We�ll have to wait for everybody to leave, and then if there�s an extra coat, it�s his.�

Decker scowled. �There ought to be a quicker way. Bank, I�d like you to mosey around and pick up whatever information you can. I�ll find me a place to set up shop. Anything you hear, let me know.�

�Sure,� Bank said. �I got me a private pipeline. A real nice one.�

He went downstairs. Most of the guests had left the tent and congregated on the ground floor, which resembled a hotel lobby with three conventions going and all the delegates wandering into the wrong rooms. Bank, looking for Carol and hoping she�d see him in action and be duly impressed, strutted like the big-prize winner.

He picked up his first piece of information from Early�s supper partner. She was a middle-aged dowager and she was talking excitedly.

�He was supposed to sit next to me,� she said, �but he never came to the table. I was worried and I almost went looking for him because I knew he had a heart condition. He must have felt sick and gone to Mrs. Hoskins� room to rest up. How terrible!�

Bank moved off, horned in on a few useless tidbits of gossip, and heard everybody discussing how many people were there whom they didn�t know. Which, to Bank, meant there was a pretty slim chance of picking out the uninvited guest � the man nobody knew.

He brought the news back to Decker, who had established temporary headquarters in a small cubbyhole just off the front door. The place was apparently a steward�s or butler�s office, and it had a tall antique secretary-desk with pigeonholes crammed with bills, menus, addresses, receipts, and all the other notes and papers pertaining to the complicated running of a large house. The phone was on a taboret next to the desk.

The Lieutenant listened glumly to what Bank had to report, and then brought him up to date on the investigation. The Medical Examiner had released the body, and it showed that Early had been shot at close range, practically a contact wound. The bullet � four lands with a right-hand twist � said .38 Smith & Wesson.

Although Decker had to check on a couple of hundred guests and almost a hundred workers, and was proceeding to do so, he was more interested in what he called the �in� group.

�This, for instance,� he said. He picked up an invoice from one of the pigeonholes. �A liquor bill of almost a thousand last month, including Richebourg at twelve bucks a throw. What was this guy Hoskins like, anyhow? How did he react when you first saw him?�

�Negative,� Bank said. �He�s a cold fish. Cash register type.�

�They all are,� Decker said. �This desk is Jasper�s, the butler�s, and there�s not a single personal item in it. Bank, I can�t get the feel of the case, which is where you come in. That bunch out there � find out what they thought of Early.�

�I�ll ask around,� Bank said.

�That gun bothers me, too. How did it get there? A society burglar or one of the guests toting it? Nuts. They don�t pack guns, and certainly not two-pound cannons that would pull their clothes out of shape. I�ll bet you two bucks to two bits that that gun was in the house before the party started, and that it�s still here.�

The odds were too good to pass up, so Bank pulled a quarter out of his pocket and put it on the desk. The Lieutenant placed a pair of bills next to it, and he grinned for the first time. �That quarter goes in the piggy bank for my grandson,� he remarked.

Bank stared sadly at his coin and figured it was lost. �Expect to search the house later on?� he said.

�We won�t find the gun,� Decker said cryptically. �We�ve got to make it find us.� And then he launched into one of his rhetorical flights, which meant he was all heated up. He used big words and said he refused to believe in a fortuitous concatenation of circumstances. Bank repeated the phrase a few weeks later to a dame he wanted to impress, and did. This, Decker went on, was the ineluctable outcome of individual forces working on each other to accomplish a preordained tragedy, and unless you grasped the Concept and proceeded from there, you were doomed to complete and total lack of success.

Bank summed up the speech in two words. �Inside job,� he remarked laconically.

Decker nodded. �Right,� he said.

Bank, inflating his chest and towering over the mob outside, continued his search for Carol, and this time he found her. She was in the middle of confiding to a sad young man that she knew one of the detectives, and her eyes lit up when she spied Bank.

�I was hoping you�d find time for me,� she said to Bank.

�Always have time for you,� he said. �How are you getting along?�

She sighed. �It�s so awful,� she said. �It spoils everything. Vicky�s party, Daddy�s big moment, Mommy�s trip��

�Trip?� Bank said, interrupting. �Where to?�

�To Paris, just for a few days, for a reunion with some old friends.�

�And what was your Daddy�s big moment?�

�He�s due to get an honorary degree from his alma mater next week. He was so happy and proud, but this takes the pleasure out of it.�

Bank, trying to imagine Peter Hoskins enjoying anything except counting his money, blinked. �He and Early were pretty close, as I understand it.�

Carol nodded. �Yes. They went to college together, and ever since then Daddy has taken care of him � given him better and better jobs and almost made him part of the family. I called him Uncle Ron, although I never really liked him.�

�Why not?�

�I don�t know. I just didn�t.�

�Think he�d rob your mother�s safe?� Bank asked.

�You make it sound so ugly,� Carol said, shuddering.

�It�s plenty ugly, but you can help me a lot. Tell me, does Jasper know the combination of the safe?�

�Of course,� Carol said innocently. �He knows everything. He�s been with us for over ten years and he�s sweet. He used to find all my toys when I was a child. I have a habit of losing things, but Jasper always knew where they were. I used to hide them on purpose and pretend they were lost, just to see if he could find them. He always did. He knows every nook and corner of the house.�

�Valuable guy,� Bank said. �Maybe he knows where the stolen jewelry is.�

Carol�s blue eyes gave Bank a cool stare. �Please don�t joke,� she said.

�It�s no joke. Tell me more about Jasper, and about your Uncle Ron, too.�

�I�d rather not,� Carol said. �You make me feel like a stool pigeon.�

�That�s a strange thing to say. You want to see the case solved, don�t you?�

�Not if it means hurting people like Jasper.�

�Oh. I didn�t know you were in love with him.�

�I�m not,� she said, and added flirtatiously, �I�m in love with you.�

�That�s mutual,� he said awkwardly, and he had a yen to do something sensational � like make an arrest, pull the jewels out of one of the potted plants, toss off a brilliant deduction � anything dramatic, to impress Carol.

�Look,� he said. �Mind if I stick around after everybody�s gone? A couple of things I�d like to talk to you about, in private.�

�About the case?� she said.

�Hell no. I just want to finish that story I was telling you at dinner.�

She gave him a dazzling smile. �Then wait for me here, in the hallway,� she said. �I just love your stories about crime and criminals.�

The roll of a drum calling for silence made them turn away from each other, and Bank watched Peter Hoskins climb up on a chair to make an announcement.

�My friends,� he said, �you�re all aware of the tragedy that has occurred, and I can only express my sorrow.� He seemed to choke up for a second, before going on. �That isn�t what I meant to say. I�ve been speaking to the police and they believe that the stolen jewelry may still be on the premises. I suggested that my guests would be willing to submit to a personal search on their way out. I�d like to apologize for the necessity, but�� He choked up again. �Well, that�s all.�

Bank grunted and found that Carol had left him. Somebody tapped him on the shoulder and he swung around to face Vinny. His usually bright, cheerful face looked haggard.

�Expect to find the jewels in somebody�s pocket?� Vinny asked.

�No, but we have to give it a try.� Bank patted his friend on the arm. �A hell of an engagement party for you,� Bank said.

Vinny nodded. �I know. Wrong time, wrong place, but Bank � it was the right guy.�

�What do you mean by that?�

�There was something about Early I never liked. He was a little too smooth. I wish I could spell it out for you, but I can�t.�

�Try,� Bank said.

�It�s chemical, I guess,� Vinny said. �Vicky�s chemical. From the first minute I saw her, I knew she was for me. With Early, it was the other way round. Nothing I can put my finger on. I just felt he was a heel.�

�Carol didn�t like him, either,� Bank observed.

�Neither did Vicky,� Vinny said. �But the old man � Hoskins, that is � you can�t fool him. He knows people, and he trusted Early.�

�Maybe he trusted him too much,� Bank said.

�Hoskins never trusts anybody too much,� Vinny said bitterly. �He�s shrewd, my friend. He trusts nobody.� Then Vinny�s face brightened into his normal, open smile. �I�m talking too much,� he said. �I�d better go find Vicky.�

The exodus started soon after that. People filed up to the cloakroom, collected their wraps, and stood submissively at the front door. There, Charlie Small and Ed Balenky frisked the men, while a policewoman searched the women. Hoskins and Vinny, at Decker�s request, checked off the names of all guests as they left.

Bank shouldered his way through the waiting line and entered the tiny room where Lieutenant Decker was still at work. Briefly, Bank repeated what Vinny and Carol had told him. Decker listened intently, then stood up.

�I�d like to talk to them, and have a look at this mob on their way out. You can take the phone a while. Donnegan, up at the precinct, will be calling in, and I asked Joe to get down to the Identification Room and run some M.O. cards to see what he can come up with.�

Bank took the chair that Decker had vacated, and for the next half hour Bank loafed, answered the phone and let his imagination paint pictures of Carol and himself. Nothing important occurred either on the phone or inside his mind, and he was leaning back and thinking of the dinner he�d never finished, when the Lieutenant returned.

�All present and accounted for,� he said. �No uninvited guest. Nobody trying to sneak out with a concealed pocket. Just a bunch of solid citizens cooperating with the police. Anything happen here?�

�Nothing much,� Bank said, and reported the minor business that he�d handled. Then the door opened and Mitch Taylor came in. He was carrying a coat and he had that smug look of having turned up something important, but not wanting to brag about it.

�Chief,� he said, �maybe we got something. This one coat � it�s left over.�

�Anything in it?� Decker asked.

�Some addresses in the pocket,� Taylor said, handing Decker a few crumpled scraps of paper. �But the thing is, everybody around here is loaded. None of them would wear a coat that didn�t set them back a hundred and fifty bucks at least, and this one�� He held it up to show the label. �Cheap, chain-store stuff.�

Decker grabbed the coat. �You think the killer left this behind?�

�Well,� Taylor said, �somebody did.�

Decker smoothed out the notes and read one of the addresses.

�Helen R. 54 Parkside,� He swung around abruptly and roared at Bankhart. �What the hell are you grinning at?�

�That�s my coat,� Bank said drily. �On my salary, where do you think I buy clothes?�

Decker burst out laughing. �Brother!� he said. �You and your harem!� He heaved the coat at Bank. �And take care of the thing before somebody swipes it.�

It was after one in the morning by the time the Homicide Squad finally cleared out. Decker posted a pair of precinct cops outside the house and gave Bank permission to stay behind. Decker himself, along with a couple of the squad, would go to work on the names of the orchestra and catering staff. Jub Freeman was due to stay up most of the night analyzing the physical evidence he�d collected. Later in the morning a weary bunch would dig in and hope for some good leads to work on.

Bank, waiting for Carol and wondering whether she�d really keep their appointment, sat down on one of the tapestried chairs in the entrance foyer. He wasn�t happy. With the �in� he had, he should have spotted some essential clue and hooked it up to the homicide. He felt he�d missed out somewhere; it left him restless and brooding.

He could hear the sounds of the household getting ready to retire for the night. A door slammed, a voice muttered something upstairs, water ran in a bathroom. A floorboard creaked, an electric motor vibrated faintly. After a while Carol came downstairs. She had taken off her party dress and was wearing a satin house-gown.

�Jim,� she said softly. It was the first time she�d called him by name. �What did you want?�

�This,� he said, and he took her in his arms and kissed her. She seemed to melt into him before she pulled away.

�Now,� she said, sighing, �tell me what you really want.�

He chuckled. �I�d like to look around the house. You know where things would be hidden � you said you used to hide your toys. Where?�

�Whom do you suspect?� she asked.

�A smart crook who was smart enough to park the stuff here for a while and who expects to come back.� And he explained the theory of the uninvited guest.

She listened with interest. �Maybe,� she said, �but you can�t use me to snoop. I told you that before.�

�I�ve got a job to do.�

�Then do it without me,� she said.

�Can�t. Carol, you�re holding out on me, and that�s all wrong. Tell me. You�ll feel better for it.�

�But it�s so much fun to hold out,� she said, frankly teasing him. �I just love the way you look at me, as if you weren�t quite sure what to make of me.�

�You�re a strange girl,� he said. �I can�t quite figure you out.�

�And you�re not going to. At least, not tonight. Because it�s late, and I�m awfully tired.�

�Tomorrow, then?� he said. But she merely smiled and led him to the door. There he kissed her again, and while her arms were around him, he slipped the latch. He went outside quietly.

The pair of precinct cops recognized him, and he spoke to them in a loud voice. �Boy, am I pooped! It�s been quite a night.� Then he signaled them not to ask questions, and he walked over to a clump of bushes and stationed himself there, concealed from the house.

After about ten minutes he stepped out, signaled the cops again, and tiptoed back to the house. He opened the door carefully and slipped inside. He had a feeling that something had to happen. Thinking back, something pulsed at the back of his mind � the recollection of something wrong, of something that somebody had said or done, which he�d only half noticed at the time and then, in the excitement of events, had forgotten.

He stood silently in the hallway. It was lit dimly by a night light. He frowned, uncertain what to do next. He wished he had his gun. According to regulations, he was supposed to carry it at all times, but who in hell would carry a gun at the Hoskins� posh engagement party? Still�

He heard the creak of a board, the slight jar of someone colliding with the banister on the floor above. He moved back, ducked down behind a chair, and crouched there, out of sight.

After a few moments Carol came down the stairs. She was still wearing her house-gown, but she was barefoot and she walked stealthily. He watched her glide across the hallway and stop in front of the darkened doorway of Jasper�s office. She hesitated, as if she knew she was under observation.

She stepped back suddenly and looked around. The dim light splashed on her cheek, and she rubbed it gently. Then, in a quick change of mood, she raised her head defiantly, pushed open the office door, and stepped inside.

Bank stayed where he was. He heard the swish of Venetian blinds being drawn. A light snapped on and Carol came to the doorway for a final look around. When she went inside again, Bank crossed the hallway and stopped in plain view. She was too intent on what she was doing to notice him.

He watched her shovel papers out of the pigeonholes, reach inside, and rummage. At the third pigeonhole she found what she was looking for. A section of the desk swung out and revealed a secret compartment. Bank waited long enough for her hand to emerge with a fistful of jewelry and a very businesslike revolver. The Lieutenant had been right � Bank�s bet was lost.

Bank must have made a noise just then. Carol whirled, holding the gun and pointing it at him.

�You!� she exclaimed.

�Better put it down on the desk,� Bank said calmly. �It�s no use.�

�You think�� She broke off as he took a step forward. �Don�t!� she said sharply.

Bank forced himself to smile. �Going to shoot me, Carol?�

�If you take one more step � yes.�

�What do you expect to do?� Bank asked. �You can�t get away with this. You realize that, don�t you?�

�I�ll tell you exactly what I�m going to do,� she said. �I�m going to drive out to the country and throw these things away where nobody can ever find them, and then I�m going to come back and go to bed, and nobody can prove I even left my room. If you claim I did, I�ll just laugh at you.�

�Go ahead,� Bank said.

There were two cops outside, and they�d grab her as she went out the front door. And even if there was an inside passageway to the garage and if she got past the cops, all Bank had to do was pick up a phone as soon as she left.

�And,� Carol said, as if she was reading his thoughts, �I�m going to lock you in a closet while I�m out. Now step back.�

She was quite a gal, and she had a fair chance of getting away with her scheme, for the time being, anyhow. She�d get caught eventually, but Bank thought of how the squad would ride him. The boob who got himself locked up in a closet. She�d double-talked him right from the beginning, played him for a sucker.

Romance!

It was more than his pride could take, and he stood in front of her and put his hands on his hips and laughed at her.

�I�ll give you exactly two seconds to move,� she said. �One��

Her blue eyes were cold. This must have been the way she�d looked when she had killed Early, standing no more than a foot away from him, the gun almost touching his heart. Then�

Bank stepped back. �I wouldn�t want to stand in your way,� he said. �Impolite. So just tell me what to do.�

�Turn around and walk to that coat closet,� she said. �Over there.� She gestured with the gun and indicated with a toss of her head where she wanted him to go. The instant her eyes left him he dived.

The explosion of the gun practically burst his eardrums, and he felt something hot sear his scalp. But he had his hand on the barrel of the gun and was twisting it away from him when something crashed on his head and knocked him sideways. He went sprawling. The gun bounced out of Carol�s hand and he landed on top of her and knocked the breath out of her. She gasped, and her body squirmed. He rolled free, climbed to one knee, and whirled.

Peter Hoskins was standing a few feet away, and he had the gun. It was aimed directly at Bank.

�I was afraid of something like this,� Hoskins said.

Bank glared. Carol, with barely enough breath to speak, managed to say, �Daddy � what��

�Let me handle things,� Hoskins said to her. �What brought you down here?�

�Him,� she said, pointing at Bank. �He kept saying the jewelry was hidden in the house and that the police would come back and look. I was afraid they�d look here, because it�s the best place to hide things, isn�t it?�

�Apparently not,� Hoskins said, �since it�s the first place you thought of.� He pursed his lips. �Get up, the pair of you.� He waited for them to stand up before he addressed Bank. �How did you figure things out?�

�We had you tagged right from the beginning,� Bank said, and he wondered why he hadn�t guessed right off. Hoskins and Early � best friends were always the ones who killed each other. Husbands killed wives and business partners killed each other. The closer people were to each other, the greater the likelihood of concealed and repressed hatred.

�The cocktail glass,� Bank said, voicing for the first time the clue that must have been there in the back of his mind. �Early wouldn�t have gone into the bedroom carrying a cocktail unless he expected a friendly chat with somebody he knew pretty well. Like you.�

�I shouldn�t have left it there,� Hoskins said. �Was that my only mistake?�

�Just tell me why you did it,� Bank said. �Why did you kill him?�

�Go out into the hall,� Hoskins said. �Both of you.�

They obeyed, and Hoskins, with the gun still on Bank, edged back into the doorway. One of Hoskins� shoes trampled on a diamond bracelet. He swayed and almost tripped, then kicked the thing aside, as if it was so much junk.

�Why did you kill him?� Bank asked again.

�He was a rat,� Hoskins said bitterly. �We were friends in college, close friends, and it all goes back to that, when he took some exams for me. I was no good in sciences, and he took some chemistry and physics exams for me. A couple of other people knew about it, so Ron could prove it easily.

�I was always grateful to him. I took him into my firm and gave him a good job. I thought he was my best friend. Then, when I was offered an honorary degree, the greatest thing in my life, he threatened to tell about that old exam business. I know what that would have meant. Cancellation of the degree. Scandal and everybody laughing at me.�

�Daddy!� Carol exclaimed. �It wouldn�t have mattered.�

�It would have mattered to me,� Hoskins said coldly. �He wanted a million dollars to keep quiet � a million in stocks and bonds, and a full partnership. But nobody can do that to me. Nobody orders me around.

�I told him I�d give him my answer this evening. Luckily I had a gun that I�d bought many years ago, when we once had a robbery scare. It was a gun nobody knew about and that couldn�t be traced. So I told him to come upstairs to my wife�s room. There I shot him, opened the safe, took out the jewelry and cash so that it would look like a burglary, and then I brought the stuff down here, to the best hiding place I knew.�

�Daddy,� Carol said shakily, �put down that gun. You�ll��

�Exactly,� Hoskins said. And still covering Bank, Hoskins edged back into the small room and slammed the door. Seconds later, the shot rang out.

Bank looked at Carol. She was standing stiffly, as if paralyzed. When he moved toward her, she shuddered and said in a choked-up voice, �Don�t touch me!�

Bank sighed. Then he stepped past her and opened the door.